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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25384345">Baby, Talk Me Down (Take Me Out)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiwi37/pseuds/sage'>sage (kiwi37)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Bruce Wayne Tries to Be a Good Parent, Canon-Typical Violence, Clark Kent Enables Him, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, i feel like this needs a hand-holding tag now honestly, im throwing canon out the window and picking the pieces i like out once it hits the pavement, is that the tag for fake dating now??, its fake dating, will add tags as necessary - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 11:35:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>89,330</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25384345</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiwi37/pseuds/sage</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Tim has been working too hard lately, and everyone is starting to notice. Bruce takes it upon himself to help Tim do some self-care and ships Tim off to the Kent farm for the summer, forcing him to take a well-earned vacation. Naturally, things get out of hand.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>474</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>616</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hello! This is my first stab at a chaptered fic, so I'm not totally sure what I'm doing here, but I'm excited to give this a go! Expect fluff and emotions, because I live for that shit. Also, still un-beta'd, because I have no fandom friends. I'm going to try to post on a weekly basis, so keep an eye out for me! Please enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tim has a rough night. For some reason, Gotham's criminals are out in more force than usual—nothing major, no obvious supervillain activity, but every mugger, rapist, and mob goon in the city seems to have decided that tonight is their night. Tim breaks up four muggings, two straight-up beatings, three attempted rapes, a convenience store robbery, two house burglaries, and a small human trafficking ring in the form of an orphanage manager trying to sell the kids. And that's just <em>his</em> route; Bruce, Dick and Damian, Jason, and Cass all report similar numbers, which is a bad night even for Gotham.</p><p> </p><p>He's exhausted by the time he drags the last of his catches for the night to the nearest police station, gets back to the cave, changes out of his Red Robin suit, and collapses against the side of a stall in the showers. He lets himself stand there under the warm water for a lot longer than he normally would; he shouldn’t be wasteful, but he has trouble dragging himself up again once his back hits the wall, and the pressure and heat of the water hitting his skin feels <em>good. </em>It's nice. Not a lot has felt good lately, he realizes.</p><p> </p><p>It's a depressing thought, and it jolts him out of his reverie enough that he does finally reach over to turn the water off, drying off and throwing on the old pair of sweats he keeps in the cave before trudging up out of the Batcave to his room in the manor. He's been spending most of his time at his own apartment lately, but it's nearly four in the morning, and he's not sure he has it in him to drive back now.</p><p> </p><p>Fortunately, he left his secondary laptop and two monitors here when he moved out, so he still has a setup to start doing research when he can’t sleep. He's hit that wired sort of exhaustion, his brain whirring unhelpfully between various anxieties in a way that means he's going to be awake until he runs his body down to the point that his brain finally overloads and gives up. It's been happening more and more frequently lately; he can hear Bruce's little voice in his head, telling him he needs to control himself, that he should meditate, clear his mind, that exhaustion makes you sloppy. Bruce wouldn’t be wrong, either, but it's so much easier to just work until his brain shorts out, bury himself in numbers and codes and patterns until they all blur together and he can finally sleep without dreaming of anything more than birds in an open sky.</p><p> </p><p>So that's what he does; he still thinks the number of relatively petty crimes tonight seems strange, and he starts digging, looking for recent escapes from Arkham, new businesses or residents moving in that might align with some out-of-town influence, poring over the family's own files of recent encounters with the usual crowd.  He checks the general crime statistics too, recent police records, but no matter how many angles he tries to approach the problem from, there's no pattern or clue that he can find. If there's something nefarious going on in Gotham, Tim has to admit that he doesn’t have the information or the context to find it.</p><p> </p><p>Or he could just be too tired, he muses, slumping back in his desk chair to stare at the ceiling. He hasn’t slept more than a few hours in the last week, and he's finally hit the wall. It's been light outside for more than an hour and he still doesn’t really want to sleep at all, but his body is in a state of total rebellion over his self-abuse; the thought of going down to breakfast makes him feel vaguely nauseous. It doesn’t feel like he can move much further than the bed anyway, so he kicks one foot against the floor until his rolling chair hits the edge of the bedframe and he can tip himself in.</p><p> </p><p>He stays where he lands, head at the foot of the bed, no energy left to shift into a more comfortable position. He feels like his brain is in a thick glass case; he can see and feel, but everything seems far away despite its perfect clarity, and his thoughts feel like they’re just bouncing around, pinging off the walls without going anywhere or connecting to each other. Still, he lays there for a long time before his eyelids grow too heavy to continue staring blankly, unseeing, and he drifts off without finding any peace.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>It's nearly three in the afternoon before he stumbles into the manor’s main dining room, still wearing last night's sweats, teeth clean but hair unbrushed, and finds Bruce and Clark seated at the table.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” he says, still feeling too slow and groggy to form much emotional response to the unusual sight. “Hi, Clark. Hi, Bruce.”</p><p> </p><p>Clark smiles. It's the same warm, friendly smile he gives everyone, but it still makes Tim feel safe and comfortable. Tim thinks he's probably cheating somehow. Stupid Kryptonians. “Hi, Tim. How are you?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim rubs at one eye with the heel of his palm and shrugs. “I’m okay, thanks. Are you just visiting?”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, sort of. I was in the area, so I thought I would stop by and catch up with Bruce, and Alfred put together a wonderful afternoon tea,” he says, all of his humble, Kansas-boy charm working overtime. Tim takes this to mean that Bruce had called him to the house on pain of death and never tasting another one of Alfred's scones again. He could probably have just asked, but Bruce doesn’t like to admit he has friends. Still, it's none of Tim's business, so he shrugs again.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s nice,” he says, and turns to make his way into the kitchen. “Good to see you—”</p><p> </p><p>“Actually,” Clark cuts in, “I also have something of a proposition for you.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim pauses and turns back, quirks an eyebrow. “You’re propositioning me? In front of Bruce and everything?” It's more the type of joke that Jason would make, but apparently in repairing the damage he did last night (this morning?), his eight hours of exhausted unconsciousness hadn’t quite managed to get his brain-to-mouth filter up and running again. It's pretty funny how Clark blushes, anyway.</p><p> </p><p>“Not like that! I was wondering if you might want to—well…” He trails off, glancing at Bruce, and Tim's eyes narrow as Bruce straightens up, the motion just barely perceptible. This can’t be good, he decides, and has to fight hard against the urge to just keep walking into the kitchen.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim,” Bruce begins, his tone carefully controlled. <em>Here we go</em>, Tim thinks. “I feel that it would be healthy for you to take some time off of work. And your… other obligations.”</p><p> </p><p>“...Right,” Tim says, frowning. This isn’t what he was expecting, but he sees why Bruce would think so, and it's no good fighting him when he talks like that. “Sure, I can… schedule a couple of days off sometime soon. I have some stuff to wrap up, but maybe the week after next—”</p><p> </p><p>“Clark and I were thinking,” Bruce cuts in, still talking in that slow, carefully-enunciated way that makes Tim's teeth ache with anxiety, “that you could spend the summer at the Kent farm.”</p><p> </p><p>“I—okay. <em>What</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>“I know the last few years have been difficult, Tim, but you can't work them away. Even I took time away after I got… unstuck.”</p><p> </p><p>“You took a really long work trip,” Tim corrects him. “I’m not trying to be ungrateful, that's a really nice offer, but I have things to do here, Bruce. I can’t just drop everything and run off to live on a farm for a couple of months because I've had a rough time. Besides, if that's what we're doing, I can think of quite a few people in this house who should be going to the farm with me.” He crosses his arms over his chest, trying not to feel defensive and mostly failing. Bruce thinks he's doing a nice thing, he reminds himself. Or at least a necessary thing.</p><p> </p><p>Bruce sighs. “I can’t make you go if you don’t want to, Tim, speaking either as your former guardian or physically. I'm not going to strap you down and fly you out against your will, and I won’t tell you that you have to ‘or else'.  But I really think it would be the best thing for you. I've already made the arrangements, if you're willing to take the offer.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim quirks an eyebrow, curious. “The arrangements?”</p><p> </p><p>“I spoke to Kate, and in exchange for access to certain information, she agreed to help cover a section of the city on a regular basis. The rest of your route and cases can be redistributed to myself and the rest of the family,” Bruce explains, watching Tim carefully.</p><p> </p><p>“Hm,” Tim says, eyeing him right back. That's nice, that Bruce would share his coveted information and volunteer for more work, go to such a length for Tim, but it's not like being a vigilante is his whole life anymore. “Wayne Enterprises?”</p><p> </p><p>“Lucius and I will be splitting your workload. He’s concerned about you, too, you know.”</p><p> </p><p>“Drake Industries?” Tim asks, frowning at Bruce. This is all so neat, it's almost condescending. Bruce looks particularly pleased, as far as Bruce's expressions go, at the mention of Tim's personal company.</p><p> </p><p>“Tam Fox,” he says, sounding just a touch smug.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow,” Tim says. Sometimes having friends is a huge pain in the ass. He's tired, though, and hungry, and he can see that Bruce is geared up for a full-on argument over the idea. Part of him wants to just let Bruce ship him off and be done with it, go dig breakfast out of the fridge and crawl back in bed, but the stubborn part of him is pissed off enough that he wants to keep fighting it. He presses his lips together, posture tight and fingers drumming an erratic beat on his arm as he starts mentally cataloguing the reasons why it's still a bad idea, deciding which to start with.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner will be there, too,” Clark pipes in, looking anxious. “You’re friends, right? And Ma really loves having guests—she was excited to finally meet you. It might be fun?”</p><p> </p><p>Well, shit. <em>Stupid Kryptonians</em>, Tim thinks again. Clark has to know that that's going to throw a huge wrench in his plans to fight Bruce tooth and nail until he acquiesces and gets his nose out of Tim's business. After all, Conner is his best friend, and they… haven’t seen each other much lately. Tim wouldn’t exactly say that he's been <em>avoiding</em> Conner, except that he kind of has, and feels like crap about it. And the Ma Kent thing? The prospect of disappointing the legendary Martha Kent? He's not a <em>monster. </em></p><p>
  
</p><p>Bruce must see the hesitation in Tim's face, because he pounces. “Martha has been very kind in offering her hospitality,” he adds. “I believe she's been in contact with Alfred, asking about your favorite foods and any special arrangements that might make your stay more enjoyable.”</p><p> </p><p>Fuck. Tim glares openly at Bruce, who smiles beatifically back, knowing that he's won.</p><p> </p><p>“This is conspiracy,” Tim snaps at him, furious. Bruce just smiles a little wider, making no motion to dismiss the accusation. Gritting his teeth, Tim turns to Clark and forces the corners of his lips upward. His whole face feels tight.</p><p> </p><p>“Well. Thanks, Clark. I guess I can't refuse an offer like that.” Clark grins cheerfully back at him, appearing totally oblivious to the murderous frustration in Tim's rictus smile.</p><p> </p><p>“Any time, Tim!”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Apparently Clark is also here to provide ferry service—it’s a few hours to the Kent farm by plane, but with the aid of one of Batman's more ridiculous contingency devices, Superman can cut it down to about ten minutes, accounting for Tim's relative comfort. Tim has to unclench his jaw every time he thinks about how neatly this has all been planned, all of his friends and family happily working behind his back—for his own good, of course.</p><p> </p><p>He has another one of those depressing moments as he's packing. He still has a pretty full wardrobe at the manor, so he doesn’t bother asking Clark to stop at his apartment before they head out. Tim now understands that it's better not to give Clark any more information than absolutely necessary, anyway. He's working on cramming his work phone and the laptop he used for his research last night into his duffle bag when Alfred coughs delicately from the doorway, raising his eyebrows. They do a sort of silent dance where Tim gives his best puppy dog eyes, Alfred frowns disappointedly, and Tim finally sighs and puts the laptop back on his desk. Alfred doesn’t leave until he puts the phone back, too.</p><p> </p><p>And then he's left with his luggage, which is about ten days’ worth of clothes, including some “roughing it” clothes and a nice button down and slacks, because you never know. Packed in beside all those neatly folded clothes are a few basic toiletries, and… that's it. It gives Tim a weird feeling to realize that there's apparently nothing in the world that he likes enough to pack on a two-month trip just because he doesn’t want to be without it. He zips his bag up quickly.</p><p> </p><p>Once he finishes packing, he makes his way down to the Batcave without haste, still sort of dragging his feet. He feels justified, since Clark has apparently dedicated his entire day to just this one venture. Which is sort of sweet, if Tim thinks about it, but right now he would rather think about how absolutely infuriating it is that everyone in his life and a good handful of people he doesn’t even know have come together with the single-minded goal of shipping him out of town.</p><p> </p><p>When he gets down to the cave, eyeing Bruce's… contraption skeptically, Bruce comes up and grasps his shoulder. “It’s safe,” he assures Tim, noticing the direction of his wary gaze.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s a Batcarrier. Like a cat carrier. You made yourself a giant, people-sized Batcarrier in case Superman ever needed to tote you around the country.”</p><p> </p><p>“I… suppose that's one way of looking at it,” Bruce says, looking a little off-put. Tim's not wrong, though. It's a carrier that's a little too tall to be a sphere, about six and a half feet at the highest point and flat on the bottom, with a glass windshield and a handle on top. It has a small engine and a few basic controls in case of emergency, but mostly there's a seat in it and a little room for storage—just big enough for two people. Or one person and a medium-sized duffle bag, Tim supposes.</p><p> </p><p>“I hope you know I'm not banishing you, Tim,” Bruce tries again, squeezing his shoulder. “I actually would like for you to go and have a nice time. Get some rest.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shrugs, tired, and it's not quite a request for Bruce to let go. “I know, Bruce. I'm—thank you. For trying to look out for me.”</p><p> </p><p>“I know I'm not really your father,” Bruce says, and Tim braces himself for wherever <em>that's </em>going, “but you really are my son. I want to help you. I want you to be happy.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim freezes, but not for the reason he thought he would. He can't remember the last time Bruce said something that genuinely kind to him. Not that he's usually cruel, he's just usually… <em>Batman</em>. It makes something inside of Tim go suddenly, uncomfortably soft. He’s not fighting an order from Batman; this is really Bruce, he realizes. His friend, his mentor, his father figure, a man who's saved his life more times and ways than he can count. Trying to take care of him, and Tim is standing here acting like Bruce is a cat offering him a dead mouse.</p><p> </p><p>He hugs Bruce. It's sudden, short, fierce, Tim’s arms probably too tight around Bruce's ribs as he buries his face in Bruce's soft grey pullover. Bruce barely has time to get his arms around him and squeeze before Tim is stepping back, but Tim knows they're okay.</p><p> </p><p>“I'll try, Bruce, honest. Thank you.” If it comes out hoarse, Bruce doesn’t say anything, just puts one hand on the top of Tim's head like he's still a kid and smiles at him, only a little sad.</p><p> </p><p>“I'll text you when I'm settled,” Tim turns to tell Alfred, who's standing a little ways back and smiling his warm, genuine smile, the one that always makes Tim feel like he's done something exactly right.</p><p> </p><p>“Very good, Master Timothy. Please enjoy your vacation—I have no doubt that Mrs. Kent will take wonderful care of you.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m sure you're right,” Tim agrees, feeling lighter than he has in a long time. There's an edge to the feeling, a swollen pressure somewhere near the base of his throat that tells him to push it away, insist that he's fine and everyone should just back off, but everyone is being so nice, and Tim can't find it in himself to reject that anymore. He’s <em>tired</em> and the giving in feels good, so he smiles at Clark, as genuine as he can make it.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks for your help, Clark,” he says. “I appreciate you helping to set this all up and, uh. Dropping me off.” He can't help glancing uncertainly at the Batcarrier again, but at this point it's more just a question of the threat to his dignity. Not that he’s feeling very dignified in the first place, he supposes, so he sighs and tosses his duffle in behind the seat.</p><p> </p><p>“Of course, Tim,” Clark says in his Superman voice, confident and caring. “I’m glad you agreed to go. I really do think you'll have a good time—there’s something special about that farm, if you ask me.”</p><p> </p><p>“Not that you're biased in the slightest,” Bruce says, but it's as light-hearted a tone as Bruce is capable of when he's not being Brucie, and Clark grins at him.</p><p> </p><p>“Who, me? Never,” he waves Bruce off. “So, are you all set, Tim?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” Tim says, taking one last look around the cave. He'll be back soon enough, but he's not sure if he'll miss it or not. “Let’s go.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Ngl I've never read a Justice League comic and I have no idea how Batman actually keeps up when they need to get somewhere fast, so I just followed the spirit of the early comics and invented a ridiculous Bat-device out of thin air. Never too many Bat-devices.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim and Conner are reunited, have the first of many chats about Tim's mental health, and make fun of Batman.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hi! Straight up, I'm posting this early because this week has sucked and I need the dopamine hit. Updates will probably usually be on Sundays? Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tim climbs into the Batcarrier as Clark sheds his reporter getup, revealing the bright colors and S-shield that transform him into Superman. Clark lifts the ridiculous carrier off the cave floor, and Tim gives a little wave to Bruce and Alfred as they sink below his eye level. Bruce raises one hand in return, and Alfred smiles, and then Clark is drifting out of the cave, accelerating carefully to keep Tim as comfortable as possible. They rise until they’re just above the clouds, and Tim keeps his eyes on the sky above, trying to avoid the creepy, motion-sick sensation that accompanies catching glimpses of the earth blurring below them and realizing that it's passing at about two hundred miles per minute.</p><p> </p><p>As Clark gradually decelerates, Tim chances a glance around and takes in the vast, rolling fields that surround the Kent farm. It's honestly beautiful, especially at this time of day, the sun setting the young fields alight with late-afternoon gold until they're glowing as the breeze ripples through them. He can see why Clark thinks of this place as a little bit magical.</p><p> </p><p>They touch down in a small copse of trees near the edge of the property, Tim unlatching the door in the side of the Batcarrier and stepping out. Clark makes a strange twitching movement and suddenly has his casual clothes on again—where exactly had he been keeping those during the flight?—and takes Tim's bag for him over his protests. Tim just sighs and follows Clark down the barely-there dirt path that leads out of the trees and intersects with the long, packed-dirt road that serves as a driveway to the Kent house.</p><p> </p><p>They've barely set foot on the driveway when a white blur slams into Clark's chest with a force that makes Tim cringe. The sound of the crash is impressive, but Clark just braces himself with a single step backwards and laughs, rubbing his attacker's ears with enthusiasm.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Krypto!” he says cheerfully, trying to keep petting Krypto as the eager dog bounds around him in blurring circles, barking enthusiastically. “How ya been, boy?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim smiles as Krypto settles down enough for Clark to crouch and scratch his chin. He has to admit that it's kind of cute to see farm boy Clark back in his natural habitat—not floating above the world, saving lives as the serious and kind Superman or eyeing strangers nervously as timid reporter Clark Kent<em>. </em>Just <em>himself,</em> a happy, open man, light-hearted and comfortable in his own skin on the solid earth of this farm. Conner has never really reminded Tim much of Clark, but he sees the resemblance the most here.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim!” The shout catches him off-guard, and his head whips up as the object of that particular train of thought comes barreling up the driveway towards them, sprinting just a little too fast to be human. Conner is grinning broadly, and doesn't stop running until he can mimic Krypto's own greeting, crashing bodily into Tim and picking him fully up off the ground in a hug that leaves Tim's feet dangling six inches off the driveway. Tim laughs, reaching up to pat Conner's back as best he can with both arms squished against his sides.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Conner,” he says as his friend places him back on solid ground, still grinning at him like a total dork. “Your face is gonna get stuck that way.”</p><p> </p><p>“Worth it,” Conner tells him, reaching out again to grasp Tim’s shoulders, like he can't quite keep his hands to himself. “Man, I can’t believe you actually agreed to stay here all summer. This is gonna be so much fun.”</p><p> </p><p>“So everyone keeps telling me,” Tim says, making no move to dislodge Conner's hands. He'll admit he's been avoiding his friend lately, for reasons he himself only sort of understands, but it always gives him a warm little feeling somewhere just under his sternum to realize how genuinely <em>glad</em> Conner is to see him. He's got plenty of friends, but everyone is usually so busy, himself included, and it's easier and easier to forget that someone might think of him as a person who deserves that sort of response.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, hey, Clark,” Conner says, looking over and seeming to notice him for the first time. They're both still a little awkward around each other—how weird must it be looking at your clone? Or the person you were cloned <em>from?—</em>but they seem better these days, easing slowly into some sort of familial bond. Not father and son, but maybe cousins, like Clark and Kara, or distant siblings. “How’s it going?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not bad,” he says, looking up from where Krypto is now splayed delightedly on his back, panting as Clark scratches his belly. “I just got to have Alfred’s tea and scones, so I'd say things are going pretty well, actually. How's school?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner makes a face, slinging his arm over Tim's shoulders and looking down at him. It strikes Tim that he must have grown again, having to tilt his head so far to catch Tim's eye. “Hey, how come he gets to hang out at the manor? When do <em>I </em>get to try these legendary scones?”</p><p> </p><p>“Probably when Bruce stops thinking of you as an overpowered hooligan,” Tim shrugs. “Your youthful reputation still precedes you. Also, you didn’t answer about school.”</p><p> </p><p>“Sometimes I forget how brutal you are,” Conner says, making an even more sour face at him. “I haven’t been a <em>real</em> hooligan in years. School is okay. Y'know. Summer classes so I can graduate before they kick me out and I have to get a GED instead.”</p><p> </p><p>“It’s why you like me,” Tim informs him. “I’ll help you study, though.” That perks Conner up a little bit, and Clark smiles at them.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m glad you're staying on top of it, Conner. Why don’t you two head on up to the house? You can tell Ma I'll be up in a little while. Krypto could use some exercise, I think.” Sure enough, the dog is on his feet again, bounding back and forth so fast that he's starting to work paw-sized grooves into the driveway in his excitement.</p><p> </p><p>“Sure,” Conner says, taking Tim's bag from Clark when he offers it and tugging Tim up the driveway as Clark and Krypto head for the trees again. “C’mon, you can meet Ma! She's been cleaning all week; she's really excited to meet one of Alfred's kids. I think they're like, pen pals or something now.”</p><p> </p><p>“That is equal parts adorable and terrifying,” Tim says, and lets Conner lead the way.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>They walk the half mile or so up the driveway slowly, chatting easily about nothing important. Tim keeps noticing the way the late afternoon sunshine paints Conner's cheekbones with golden light and deepens the shadows at his temples and below his jaw. The grin and the sparkling eyes are still the same in that open, friendly face, but he looks more adult than Tim remembers, and it's weird how much his friend seems to have changed since Tim sort of… stopped paying attention.</p><p> </p><p>“You okay, dude?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” Tim says, brain catching up to the slightly awkward pause in the conversation. “Just—did you get taller? It hasn’t been <em>that </em>long.” Conner laughs and scratches the back of his neck.</p><p> </p><p>“Ma tells me that the same thing happened to Clark,” he says shrugging. “He was like 5’8 from puberty through the end of high school, and then between eighteen and twenty-two he grew another seven inches.”</p><p> </p><p>“Jesus,” Tim mutters. “Are <em>you</em> gonna get that tall? Between you, Cassie, and Bart, I'm gonna need a step stool to look any of my friends in the eye,” he complains.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry, shorty,” Conner says, grinning remorselessly. “Maybe you'll get lucky and the Luthor genes will stunt my growth?”</p><p> </p><p>“Lex is like, almost as tall as Superman,” Tim tells him, staring at him incredulously. Conner just laughs.</p><p> </p><p>“Then I guess you're out of luck. It's cool, I'm learning woodworking in shop class. I'll build you that stool for my next project.”</p><p> </p><p>He has the nerve to <em>wink</em>, and the only reason Tim doesn’t immediately start figuring out a way to injure him horribly is because they've reached the porch of the Kent house. Conner takes all three steps in a single bound and pulls the screen door open for Tim, hollering over his shoulder, “Ma! Tim's here!”</p><p> </p><p>Tim steps into the little wooden farmhouse when Conner nods him through the door, smiling fondly at him like he knows exactly what Tim was just thinking. Looking around, he takes in the warm wooden walls, the neat little mat he's standing on and the rug in front of the couch off to one side, the dining room table to the other. It's small and cozy, little touches everywhere making it obvious that this is a <em>home</em>, and Tim is getting it more and more every minute, how this house raised someone like Superman.</p><p> </p><p>A head pokes out from the open doorway next to the dining room, and Tim gets his first sight of Martha Kent, famous in superhero circles as one of the best and most powerful people in the entire world. She's Superman's <em>mom</em>, after all, and she bakes cookies for the Justice League once a month. And now she's stepping out of the kitchen towards Tim, wiping her hands on a corner of her apron, smiling warmly at him. A woman of medium height in her early sixties, she's dressed comfortably in a button down and jeans under a simple, functional pale green apron, and her nearly-white hair is cropped short around her earlobes. She gives Tim the immediate impression of someone sharp, sensible, and deeply kind, although he supposes he may be biased by all the stories he's heard over the years.</p><p> </p><p>“Mrs. Kent,” he says, stepping forward to meet her with a smile. He offers a hand and she shakes it firmly, then pulls him into a brief hug, which he doesn’t bother resisting. “It’s really nice to meet you. Thank you so much for having me, it's incredibly generous of you to let me stay so long.”</p><p> </p><p>“Of course, Tim,” she says, keeping his hand for a second longer so she can give it a little pat. “Conner has been talking about you for years, you know. When I heard you needed a chance for some rest, how could I not offer? Please, though, call me Ma.”  </p><p> </p><p>“Thank you, Ma,” he corrects himself with a smile. “Also, I have something for you.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh now, you didn’t have to,” she tuts as Tim takes his bag from Conner's hands and opens it, digging a little before pulling out two objects. One is a plain but elegant little spiral-bound booklet; the other is a little basket containing a good-sized, handmade ceramic mug glazed in soft blues and greys and filled with a bag of fine cocoa powder, with an assortment of nice tea bags and packets of cookies tucked into the basket around the mug.</p><p> </p><p>“This one is from Alfred,” he says, offering her the notebook, “some of his best recipes for you to try. And this one is from me.”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, that's lovely, Tim,” she says, taking both items from his hands with another kind smile. “Thank you very much. Remind me why I haven’t met this young man already, Conner?”</p><p> </p><p>Still standing in the doorway, looking sort of quietly, blissfully happy about his adoptive mother and his best friend getting along, Conner just shrugs. “Bat boys. They're pretty hard to pry out of Gotham. Also, I think relaxing might be against their religion.”</p><p> </p><p>“And yet, I'm here to blaspheme,” Tim says dryly. Conner grins at him.</p><p> </p><p>“And I get to enable you. Sounds like a win-win to me.” Martha watches them with amusement, her eyebrows raised a little.</p><p> </p><p>“Why don’t you go get Tim settled, Conner? I'm almost finished with dinner; I'll call you when it's ready.”</p><p> </p><p>“Sure,” Conner agrees, taking Tim's bag back out of his hands, cheerfully ignoring his protests. Apparently it's genetic. “Clark says he'll be up soon, by the way. Krypto was feeling a little antsy.”</p><p> </p><p>Martha rolls her eyes, good-humored. “That dog's worse than a toddler on sugar. Clark can take as much time as he wants—it’ll save me a lot of cleaning up later.”</p><p> </p><p>She turns and heads back into the kitchen, and Conner leads Tim up the little staircase hugging the side of the house. There's a short hallway at the top with three doors; Ma's room, Conner's room, which used to be Clark's, and a bathroom, Tim guesses.</p><p> </p><p>Conner points each room out in turn, confirming Tim's assumption, and then opens the door to the left, leading into his room. There's a bed, a desk, a dresser, and two wooden chairs in one corner, and that's about it. The desk is a little messy, a textbook sitting open with a pile of worksheets strewn on top, but the rest of the room is neat, which Tim can only assume means Conner used his super-speed to clean up twenty minutes ago. There's also an air mattress next to the bed, which makes him laugh.</p><p> </p><p>“Like a sleepover as kids, huh?” Tim says, glancing at Conner, who just shrugs.</p><p> </p><p>“Couldn’t tell you—I kinda skipped that phase, remember? But if you don’t wanna bunk with me, the couch downstairs is a pullout. That's usually where Clark sleeps if he stays the night.”</p><p> </p><p>“No, that's okay—if you want your space to yourself, the couch is fine, but I don’t mind the air mattress if you don’t mind sharing your room.” He smiles, and Conner crosses his arms and raises an eyebrow suspiciously. Tim cocks his head. “What?”</p><p> </p><p>“Since when are you all well-adjusted and respectful of boundaries and stuff? This is not the Rob I know and love.” Tim rolls his eyes—leave it to Conner to call him on trying to behave himself.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m on vacation, I'm trying something new. I'm still going to hurt you if you keep making fun of me, though, clone boy. Ma's not gonna be around to protect you forever,” Tim says, narrowing his eyes and stepping into Conner's space to poke him in the center of the S-shield stretched across his chest. “I may have left my gear at the manor, but keep pushing it, I'll figure something out.”</p><p> </p><p><em>That</em> puts an expression on Conner's face that reminds Tim of Krypto, and his friend reaches up to ruffle Tim's hair, laughing over Tim's indignant huff. “There’s my Robin! I missed you, man.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim smacks his hand away, glaring up at him, but Conner's casual confession gives him pause, and the aggravation softens. “Yeah. I, um. I haven’t been around much lately. Sorry. I missed you, too,” he says, and realizes with a sudden ache in his chest just how much he means it.</p><p> </p><p>Conner, pain in the ass that he is, has somehow become Tim's rock somewhere along the way. There's a reason why he lost it so bad when Conner had—well. And now that he's thinking about it, maybe that has something to do with the way he's been feeling utterly adrift lately, too. Which feels weird to think about, but it's a human need, Tim supposes. Social support and all that.</p><p> </p><p>Conner is smiling down at him, an easy, fond smile that makes Tim's shoulders release a tension he hadn't realized they'd been holding. “It’s cool. Gotham's a handful, and I know how you get.”</p><p> </p><p>“’How I get?’” Tim repeats, lifting his chin. He’s pretending to be offended, but he’s also actually sort of morbidly interested in what Conner thinks of his disappearing act. He's not sure he really <em>wants</em> to know, but Tim has always been more cat than bat when it comes to curiosity.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, you know. All laser-focused so you forget to like, eat or bathe or talk to anyone who’s not a criminal you’re punching,” Conner shrugs, not making it sound like either an insult or a compliment. Tim's not sure if he feels relieved or worried about Conner's casual acceptance of that, but Conner reaches out and nudges him in the ribs, frowning a little. “That’s been happening a lot lately, yeah? You got even skinnier, and you look… tired.”</p><p> </p><p>Sighing, Tim turns and drops unceremoniously onto the air mattress, immediately flopping backwards to spread his arms wide until his fingertips dangle past the mattress's edges. Conner floats down beside him, sitting in the space between Tim's arm and body, his weight causing the mattress to dip and roll Tim a little further towards him.</p><p> </p><p>“I <em>feel</em> tired, Kon,” he admits, letting his head follow the twist of his body until he’s studying the stitching on the outer seam of Conner's jeans. “Being here, seeing you, it's… a little lighter, but back in Gotham it was sort of like I had forgotten how to feel anything but exhausted.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner nods, leaning back on his palms and tipping his head back to observe the ceiling. “Did you <em>want </em>to feel anything else?”</p><p> </p><p>The question catches Tim off-guard. It makes him pause, his stomach twisting around the ugly new thought, something he had never really considered. Has Conner always been that insightful? “I’m… not sure. I know it's not great, but I started feeling like if I stopped long enough to pay attention to how I felt, I would never get started again. It was easier to just keep working.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner collapses the rest of the way beside him, fall controlled enough that it doesn't hurt when he lands on Tim's arm, trapping him. The motion rolls Tim even closer, and Conner reaches out and hooks a thick bicep around Tim's neck, pulling him into a one-armed hug, a little too tight to really be casual. Tim breathes in the clean scent of Conner's t-shirt.</p><p> </p><p>“You ever think about therapy, Tim?” Tim snorts, relaxes into the hug and rests a hand on Conner's ribs.</p><p> </p><p>“With what therapist?” He feels Conner shrug, his friend's powerful shoulder bunching beneath his cheek, the heavy rise and fall of Conner's chest as he sighs carrying Tim like a wave in the ocean.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I guess. You can always talk to me, though, you know that, right? I'm no super-therapist, but I can listen, and you know I've got your back.” Tim smiles into the rumbling of Conner's chest as he speaks. Ruffling Tim's hair one more time, Conner releases his hold, relaxing fully to mimic Tim's initial flop onto the mattress. Tim rolls away without Conner's strength holding him in place, and startles to realize that the air in the room feels cold against the side of his body that was pressed into Conner's.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I know, Kon. Thanks.”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>They eat dinner with Clark and Ma, and Tim tries not to laugh at the way Clark keeps thinking he's being sneaky about feeding Krypto under the table. Not that there's anything wrong with the food—Ma’s cooking is as good as Alfred's, and Tim assures himself that since the two of them are friends now, his thinking that is no betrayal. Ma keeps piling food on his plate, and Conner keeps nudging him, and Tim will admit that he hasn't been eating as many calories as he really should be on days when he patrols lately, so he eats until he's so full that it almost hurts to move.</p><p> </p><p>He offers to help clean up, but Ma and Clark wave him off, Clark scrubbing the dishes as Ma dries, and Conner makes hot chocolate and takes Tim to sit out on the porch. It's late enough that things are starting to cool down, the sun nearly totally set on the horizon, and Tim watches the last, flaming rays of light sink under the horizon.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, so what's your cover story?” Conner asks after they sit quietly for a few minutes. “You're gonna come into town with me, right? Is wealthy businessman-slash-socialite Timothy Jackson Drake-Wayne really hanging out in Smallville with random local farm boy Conner Kent, or what?”</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, give yourself some credit—you aren’t <em>just</em> a random local farm boy, you're my <em>favorite</em> random local farm boy,” Tim tells him, teasing. Once he stops laughing at the face Conner makes at him, he shrugs. “I think it's better to keep it simple. I can just be your friend Tim Drake from out east. If anybody puts two and two together and figures out the ‘Wayne’ bit, we can say that you were visiting Clark in Metropolis and he dragged you to a Wayne charity gala he had to cover. We met over the tiny cheesecakes and hit it off.”</p><p> </p><p>“You guys have tiny cheesecakes at those things?” Conner asks, a little too interested. Tim smirks at him. “Shit, I really have to get on Batman's good side. Put in a good word for me, will you?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shakes his head in mock-sadness. “I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think using me as a reference is going to cut it. You've been my best friend for years and he still doesn’t trust you not to accidentally bring down an alien apocalypse on Gotham or something. Maybe try sucking up to Alfred? Or Wonder Woman. He likes Wonder Woman.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s so not fair. Nobody even wants to fight me anyway, you know? They all either mistake me for Superman or think they can use me to get to him somehow. If he's worried about an alien apocalypse, I don’t see why Clark is allowed in the manor, either.” It's hard not to laugh at the expression on Conner's face; he's got his arms crossed, and Tim is sure he would insist that he's definitely <em>not </em>pouting.</p><p> </p><p>“Clark is just barely allowed in the manor because he's secretly Bruce’s best friend. Bruce loves acting like he hates all his friends, so I'm sure he wouldn’t admit it under pain of death, but it's true,” Tim informs him, choosing to ignore the very high probability that Clark will overhear him saying it. There's a loud cough and a metallic clattering sound from inside, like a pot falling into the side of a sink. “Also because he helped Bruce plot to get me out of Gotham. Did I tell you about Bruce's Batcarrier?”</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, no?” Conner's expression is intrigued, and Tim can't help grinning as he leans forward in his seat to describe it.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s the dumbest thing I've ever seen, Conner. He built himself this little egg-pod thing with a handle on top so that Clark can carry him around at high speeds without giving him a brain hemorrhage. I named it the Batcarrier.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, wait, that's actually kind of cute,” Conner says, his face scrunching up like he's having trouble processing the concept of <em>Batman </em>and <em>cute </em>existing within a three-mile radius of each other. “They really are best friends, wow. I’m picturing Batman with a little steering wheel inside pretending to drive while Clark flies him, I think my brain is melting.”</p><p> </p><p>“There's no steering wheel, actually,” Tim tells him with perfect sincerity, “but if you want, you can make a <em>vroom </em>noise and feel like you're helping. You know, as befits the dignity of the Dark Knight.” They both crack up over that, and then Tim makes an ugly snorting noise as he tries to pull it together, and they both nearly die laughing; Tim is clutching his stomach and wiping away tears, and he can’t remember the last time he laughed like this.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow,” Conner says when he can breathe again, “that really makes me appreciate my TTK all over again. Can you imagine me having to fly you into battle in something like that?”</p><p> </p><p>“Only once it was painted in the Red Robin colors, come on now,” Tim says, grinning and shaking his head.</p><p> </p><p>“Superboy colors,” Conner corrects him, and Tim's heart does a funny little squeezing thing as he wonders if Conner realizes how right he is. “But that’s a battle you've lost before it even starts, man. The blow to your dignity alone would be so crushing, I don’t know how you'd recover enough to fend off the aliens.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, even the princess carry is better than that,” Tim has to agree. “I’ll just stick with you, if you don’t mind.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’d prefer you did,” Conner says. His smile is warm and open in the soft light spilling through the windows of the house, and Tim finds that he has to look away.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Like I mentioned in the tags, I'm basically just making up my own canon as I go here, based primarily on pre-reboot continuity. Some of it may coincide pretty closely, some of it may be wildly different. I'm trying to pay for college and only have so much money in my budget to buy comic books for research, so please forgive me.</p><p>Things I may or may not have totally made up in this chapter: Bart grows up tall mostly because I find the idea of Tiny Tim and the Tall Squad funny, and Conner is almost 20 and still in high school because that's the only way the timeline makes any sense in my brain.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim and Conner hash some things out on the water tower.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello again! This chapter is definitely, absolutely just me going back and working out some shit that I don't feel was sufficiently covered in the parts of canon I've consumed lol. And if I missed any of these conversations happening somewhere in canon... here's my take on them anyway. Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tim thinks he might be losing his mind a little bit. No big deal. It’s fine, probably.</p><p> </p><p>It's his second night at the Kent farm—the first, he’d had enough residual exhaustion from the night before, and enough excitement in the afternoon, that he’d actually been able to sleep pretty normally, falling asleep after only half an hour or so of tossing and turning. Today has been peaceful, though.</p><p> </p><p>It is—or <em>was</em>—a Friday, so Kon had done his chores and left for summer classes early in the day, before Tim even woke up, and when he'd gotten back after lunch, Tim had made good on his promise to help him study. That had taken them most of the afternoon, finishing up Conner's homework and preparing for a test next week, Tim patiently proofreading and explaining chemical equations. They had eaten dinner, Conner had done his evening chores while Tim chatted with Ma, and then they hung out and played video games on the old TV in the living room until around eleven, when Conner had started yawning and asked if Tim was ready to turn in. Tim had just shrugged and agreed; there was no need to keep Conner up to some ungodly hour just because Tim was fighting a bout of insomnia.</p><p> </p><p>Now, though, it's well past two in the morning, and Tim is just… laying here, on the comfortably made-up air mattress. Staring at the ceiling. There's no work to distract him, no laptop with case files to bury himself in until his higher brain functions shut down. It's driving him a little bit nuts, just laying here in the quiet and the dark.</p><p> </p><p>After all, normally he would be out on patrol, helping Bruce and Dick and Cass keep Gotham under control. Not that they can’t handle it without him, but he <em>should </em>be there, shouldn’t he? Is it fair for him to be laying here in this soft, quiet Kansas night while they're risking life and limb? What if they overextend themselves because he's not there and someone gets hurt?</p><p> </p><p>He can’t lose anyone else. At an hour like this, he can admit to himself that he’s never fully gotten over all the losses he's already had to absorb, no matter how many of them he got back in the end. There are plenty still gone, <em>his parents, </em>too much he’s never given himself time to recover from. And he dealt so <em>badly; </em>trying to clone Conner is still something he hasn’t really forgiven himself for. It makes him feel nauseous, how easy it had been to slip into a depravity that low, the need for any base comfort so overwhelming that it just hadn't mattered how awful of a thing he was doing. It still hangs so heavy and shameful in his heart, and what would he do if—</p><p> </p><p>“Dude, I can hear you freaking yourself out. Why aren’t you asleep?” Conner's voice is sleepy in the dark, and Tim freezes, as if that will hide his unsteady heartbeat and shallow breathing from Conner's <em>super-</em><em>hearing</em>. Genius.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” he says, voice so low it's nearly a whisper. “I haven’t been sleeping that well lately. Insomnia.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ve seen you with regular insomnia before, and your heart never beats that hard,” Conner insists, sounding a little more alert now. He pushes up off his pillow, dragging his legs around until he can sit on the side of the bed and peer at Tim. It's annoying to realize that Conner can probably see him perfectly, the dark providing no cover for the slight flush of his cheeks or the tense way he's not quite sure if he should sit up, too. On the one hand, it's weird to talk laying down now that Conner has gotten up; on the other, he doesn’t want to encourage Conner when he should rightfully be sound asleep.</p><p> </p><p>“You're creepy,” Tim tells him, tired and sour. “Stop eavesdropping on my organs, go back to bed.”</p><p> </p><p>“You know you feel better when you talk things out,” Conner tells him, and Tim doesn’t have anything to say to that, because Conner is right. He sighs as Conner stands up and approaches the air mattress; the air mattress is going to start becoming too significant, he thinks, like some weird, sacred bro-bonding mattress. He's going to have to sleep here <em>every night. </em></p><p> </p><p>Conner nips that thread of internal griping in the bud, though, because he doesn’t tumble down on the mattress beside Tim to hug him into submission again. Instead, he barely stops walking long enough to scoop Tim up out of the blankets and sling him over one shoulder, not even acknowledging Tim kneeing him viciously in the ribs. Tim hears a faint click that must be the window unlatching based on the sudden breeze against his back, and then he's watching Conner's feet lift casually off the ground as they drift into the mild night air.</p><p> </p><p>It's more revenge than protest at this point, but Tim kicks Conner in the balls anyway. Conner doesn’t so much as flinch, and Tim sighs and goes limp over his shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow, you must be a joy in bed,” he mutters into the thin cotton of the plain black t-shirt Conner slept in. Vindictive, but he feels pretty justified at this point. There's a level of manhandling Tim will tolerate while conscious, usually in the context of battling supervillainy, but this goes well beyond it. Conner twitches a little when Tim speaks, yawns.</p><p> </p><p>“Haven’t had any complaints.” Tim sighs again, and there's that subtle tensing of thick muscle beneath his cheek. It sets a little light off somewhere deep in the back of his brain, but he's too tired and annoyed to bother with it right now, so he just lays there, feels the warmth of Conner's broad back under his cheek and watches the texture of the grain fields passing slowly beneath them.</p><p> </p><p>“Where are we going?” he asks idly, not really caring. He trusts Conner not to take him anywhere <em>too </em>absurd at this hour.</p><p> </p><p>Conner doesn’t answer right away, but the wheat stalks swaying below them start to shrink and blur in the night as Conner carries them higher. After a minute, the forearm slung across Tim's calves to hold him in place becomes a hand on his waist, quickly joined by another as Conner lifts Tim off his shoulder and seats him carefully on a cool, metal surface. Tim lets him do it, resigned to his fate and a little surprised by the delicacy with which Conner executes the maneuver. Usually if Conner is moving him around like this for some reason, it's a little more rough-and-tumble unless he thinks Tim is injured. An unpleasant little voice in the back of Tim's head whispers that maybe he <em>does</em> think Tim is injured, that maybe he wouldn’t be wrong if he did.</p><p> </p><p>“I come up here to think,” Conner says, dropping to sit beside Tim on the water tower, one forearm propped up on a knee, the other arm extended behind him as he tilts his head up to observe the stars. Realizing he actually <em>can</em> see the stars is surprising to Tim—in Gotham, even when the sky is clear, the light pollution means only the brightest of stars occasionally shines through. Out here, in the wide Kansas night, the sky glitters softly with hundreds of tiny pinpricks of light. It’s strangely comforting.</p><p> </p><p>“Must be a pretty lonely water tower, then,” Tim says, but there's no venom in it, and Kon just reaches out to nudge his shoulder, barely even a push.</p><p> </p><p>“So, what's keeping you up?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim sighs, curls forward to wrap his arms around his knees, changes his mind and runs one hand through his hair. He clasps his own wrists, shrugging.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s… I don’t know. It's been happening a lot, lately. My circadian rhythms have always been fucked, but lately if I try to sleep, I just lay there and… think.”</p><p> </p><p>“About what?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim looks down, tracing an idle pattern on the dusty metal beside him. “I don’t know. A lot of things. Patrol. Open cases. People.”</p><p> </p><p>“Are you worried about leaving Gotham for so long?” Conner asks. In his peripheral vision, Tim can see him glance over sidelong, trying to gauge Tim's response. It makes him smile a little, Conner trying to be sneaky.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, kind of. It's ridiculous, right? Bruce and Dick patrolled before I came along, and they've got more help now than ever. It shouldn’t really matter if I'm gone, should it? What do I think is going to happen?”</p><p> </p><p>“Which one are you more worried about?”</p><p> </p><p>“What?” Tim looks over at Conner for the first time since the conversation began, frowning in confusion. Conner shrugs, reaching up to catch a tuft of downy bird feather as it floats by on the breeze.</p><p> </p><p>“I dunno, you asked two questions. I was wondering which one bothered you more. If it doesn’t matter that you're gone, or what might happen if you're not there.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Tim says, blinking hard. “Are you <em>sure </em>you didn’t get certified as a super-therapist recently?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner snorts. “Hardly. I just know you've gotta dig deep with you Bat-types. You gonna answer the question?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim looks back up at the moon, thinking it over for a minute. “The 'what might happen', I think. I've lost a lot of people already. I… don’t like thinking about getting a phone call in the middle of the night, not being there to prevent it.” He presses his lips together tightly, wishing he could take that back. It's a little too honest, not something he wants to burden Conner with.</p><p> </p><p>There’s a hand on his shoulder, though. “You’ve been through a lot, man. You're allowed to be scared of taking another hit,” Conner tells him, voice gentle in a way that Tim doesn’t remember having heard before. His throat feels tight as an emotion he doesn’t have a name for swells in his chest, suffocating.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m sorry I haven’t been around much lately,” he blurts, barely above a whisper as his voice suddenly fails him. He bites the inside of his cheek hard, but it doesn’t make the heat behind his eyes dissipate.</p><p> </p><p>“Aw, man,” Conner says, sad and sympathetic, and then a big, warm arm wraps around Tim's shoulders as Conner tucks him into his side. “It’s okay. I'm not mad at you or anything. I was just kind of wondering if I had done something to piss <em>you </em>off.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shakes his head, staring at his knees with determination. The hot feeling in his face and the tightness in his throat won’t go away. “No, you didn’t do anything,” he manages, his voice raspy. “I just… everything was so bad for so long, and it's better now, it is, but I still can’t stop thinking about….”</p><p> </p><p>“Shit,” Conner mutters, and wraps his other arm around Tim so that Tim's face ends up smushed into his chest, Conner's cheek resting on his hair. Tim struggles to get his breathing under control, but his lungs are fighting him, and air is coming in hiccupy little gasps that are starting to make him dizzy. “I'm sorry, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“Not your fault,” Tim whispers as Kon rubs his knuckles across Tim’s back in slow, soothing arcs.</p><p> </p><p>“No,” he agrees, “but I should have done a better job of checking in. You seemed a lot better when I saw you that second time, and I guess I just figured you were good. Which, in hindsight? Pretty astonishingly dumb, even for me.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim tries to laugh, mangles it into an ugly choking noise that makes Conner squeeze him gently. “You’re allowed to cry, you know,” Conner tells him, casual. “I know Batman's really into the whole toxic masculinity thing, but I promise not to tell. Scout's honor.”</p><p> </p><p>“You were never a scout,” Tim croaks. He smacks Conner's chest, no real force behind it, but presses his forehead against Conner's collarbone anyway and lets himself shake, teeth gritted hard as tears begin to overflow. Conner just puts a hand against the back of his neck, cradling Tim's head against his shoulder. It doesn't take long before Tim is choking out pained little sobs, and Conner pulls him in tighter, nose in Tim's hair.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s okay, Tim. I've got you,” he murmurs, and Tim wants to hit him again because that doesn’t make him want to stop crying at <em>all</em>, but he just ends up curling a fist in Conner's t-shirt, holding on. The sound of his own muffled, groaning sobs is awful in his ears—he doesn’t <em>do </em>this, but Conner has always had a way of slipping past his self-control. It's no different now than it ever has been, and the way Kon is rocking ever so slightly, holding him patiently without any indication that it's time for Tim to stop, to let go, undermines any chance Tim has of cutting himself off. They're in it together, as always, and Tim's not sure if that's better or worse.</p><p> </p><p>“I never really apologized for what I did,” he says, still muffled into Conner's shirt, when the tears have mostly subsided and his muscles relax enough that he can speak again. It might ruin this completely, this moment and everything that built it, bringing this up again. He had made the confession in Paris, but the way Conner had just shrugged it off never really sat right with him when he’d stopped to think about it after the fact. And he had been so wrapped up in his own misery, he'd never actually stopped to say the words <em>I'm sorry</em>. In a moment when Conner is offering him so much, he can't just ignore that fact; the guilt of it been hanging over his head for months, haunting him whenever he thinks of Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“’What you did'?” Conner echoes, his arms tensing around Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“When you were… gone. The… the cloning thing. I never told you I was sorry, or asked if you could forgive me. Although, I don’t really think you should.”  </p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Conner says. Tim tenses, starts to push away, but Conner locks his arms around him, stronger than steel, and there's no way Tim could escape him. “Right. I mean, you were sort of having a crisis when you told me, so I wasn’t that worried about it in the moment, but, uh. Yeah, that was kinda fucked up.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m really, really sorry,” Tim whispers, pulling back enough to watch Conner’s face. He just sits silently for a long, horrible minute, staring out over the fields, and Tim feels like every organ in his body is trying to wind itself into one big knot and make an emergency exit out of his mouth.</p><p> </p><p>“…Why did you do it?” Conner asks finally. He doesn’t sound mad, but it can be hard to tell with Conner, and Tim doesn’t relax.</p><p> </p><p>“I think I lost my mind a little bit,” Tim confesses quietly. “I mean, I knew what I was doing, I'm not trying to plead insanity, but… I don’t know. You<em> had</em> to be here. So many people were gone, and it was just too much. I couldn’t figure out how to live in a world where you weren’t here. I wasn’t trying to replace you—I knew that even if I could have regrown your body, it would never have been <em>you</em>. You’re not someone who could be replaced, not by a clone or anybody else, not ever, but it honestly felt like life or death. Either some version of you, some tiny fragment, lived, or I….”</p><p> </p><p>He can’t quite finish the sentence, and Conner tips forward a little, leaning his head on Tim's shoulder. “Jesus, Tim,” he says eventually, voice rough, and Tim's hands curl reflexively in his shirt again. “I’m not gonna lie, it does hurt pretty bad, that you tried to do that. You know having been made that way has always messed with me, and even if you say you weren't trying to replace me, that's kind of how it feels. The first model kicked the bucket, no big deal. Just initiate Kon-El two-point-oh.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m so sorry,” Tim says, and he's not sure if he's allowed to touch Kon right now, but he decides it will be worth the risk and tries anyway. Reaching up, he puts one hand on the back of Conner's neck, mimicking Conner’s gesture of comfort from earlier. “It was selfish and awful of me, and I'm so sorry for making you feel that way. You don’t deserve that.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner makes no move to shake Tim off, just breathes in deeply and exhales it into the shoulder of Tim's sleep shirt. “I kind of get it, though. If I lost Ma and Bart and Cassie and Clark, and then you on top of it all? I don’t even know what I would have done. Probably something pretty fucking weird, too. And you didn’t know I would be back. If I had died, like, forever? I would have wanted you to do whatever you had to do to stay alive, no matter what. So, I can’t really be that mad about you doing what I would have wanted you to anyway, even if it feels bad now.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim stares down at the back of Conner's head for a while, still trying to process the fact that Conner didn’t just take off as soon as Tim had mentioned it and leave him stuck up here. What he had done was unforgivable, and yet Conner is sitting here telling him that it's understandable—that it had been the right thing to do, even.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re the best person I've ever met,” Tim says, his cheek dropping to rest against Conner's head as his body gives out on him a little. “I can’t believe you're not throwing me off the water tower. I would deserve it.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner's back shakes a little, like maybe he's laughing. “Nah,” he says. “Even if I did, you know I'd just catch you, anyway.”</p><p> </p><p>“You’re something else, Conner Kent,” Tim murmurs. He's exhausted now, can feel himself trembling a little, and the tears are starting to make an embarrassing comeback. Conner squeezes him a little and pulls back to look him in the eye—Tim would really rather he not right now, because he's crying again and he's sure his face looks like a train wreck, but he owes Conner this much, at least, so he doesn’t look away. One broad palm cups the side of Tim's face, shockingly hot against the damp, cool skin, and Conner doesn't break eye contact as he speaks.</p><p> </p><p>“Just so your freaky little bat-brain can't get all tangled up about this again, I'm going to say out loud: I forgive you, Tim. I don’t like what you did, but given the options, I'm glad you did it. Coming back to a world without you would have been kind of pointless—you’re my best friend, and I need you here as much as you need me. So, we're good, Tim. Okay?”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Tim whispers. “I’m still always going to be sorry about it, though. You can be upset with me and I’ll keep apologizing, whenever you want.” Conner knocks their foreheads together gently before pulling Tim back into another hug.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Rob, but I'm good for now,” he says. “Maybe I'll pull it out later when I'm feeling mopey. If I need a little victory, I'll pull the 'you tried to clone me' card and make you admit you were wrong, just for the thrill of it.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim snorts, his breath fanning back in his face where it bounces off Kon’s neck. Conner twitches a little, but Tim doesn’t really register it. “Yeah, okay. That seems fair, I guess.”</p><p> </p><p>“I'm seriously glad you didn’t succeed, though. I've barely got my own shit together, can you imagine me trying to like… parent my clone? He wouldn’t have stood a chance,” Conner muses, and Tim's laugh is hoarse and watery, but genuine.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh my god, would that have made me his other dad? I didn’t even think about that, ew. Gross, and also he would have been completely screwed.”</p><p> </p><p>“Aww, come on, co-parenting with me would be gross?” He pokes Tim in the ribs, and Tim doesn’t have the heart or the energy to smack his hand away.</p><p> </p><p>“Only when the person I'm co-parenting is <em>your clone</em>, dork. That's just… no. So creepy.”</p><p> </p><p>They sit and banter idly for a while longer, Conner's arm still wrapped around Tim. It's comfortable, and Tim is perfectly happy to sit that way, warm against Conner's side with his face pressed into his friend's shoulder as the atmosphere fades into something tired and easy.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, come on,” Conner says after a while. “It’s like 3AM, think you could sleep now?” Tim nods, and he really means it this time. He feels wrung out, deeply physically and emotionally tired in a way he hasn’t in a long time. It feels clean and honest—not the heavy, soul-crushing exhaustion that's been dragging him into unconsciousness lately, but like he could maybe actually go to sleep and wake up okay.</p><p> </p><p>Conner stands and picks Tim up all in one motion, holding Tim casually in one arm so that Tim is sitting up against his chest, drooping with his cheek atop Conner's head and his arms draped around Conner's neck, wrists clasped for balance. His eyes drift closed, and he starts awake when Conner laughs, shaking Tim gently to get his attention.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, this isn't gonna work if you pass out,” he says, and drops Tim down into the dreaded princess-carry. Tim makes a vague, irritated noise, but immediately tucks his head into Conner's shoulder and grabs a handful of his shirt. He couldn’t say why he does that, and he doesn’t really remember the trip back—he has a vague recollection of Conner squeezing them carefully through the window, trying to pry Tim's fingers out of his shirt. The last thing he remembers is lying on something soft and feeling very, very warm.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I don't know, it just always bugged me that Conner had basically no reaction whatsoever to Tim telling him about the cloning thing in that issue of Adventure Comics? We got plenty of Tim being sad, but Conner was just kind of like "Oh okay, rough year, huh?" Like surely? he would have had?? SOME emotional response to it???</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim's attempt to "relax" and "take a vacation" was probably doomed from the start, anyway. It was bound to get complicated, right?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>We're finding the plot, y'all. Also guess who figured out how to work bed-sharing AND fake dating into this fucker in one chapter! This bitch!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It's still dark when Tim wakes up, and everything is cozy and close. There’s a thin blanket keeping him just warm enough in the summer weather, and he has one arm tucked under his head and the other curled around his waist. He feels better than he has in a long time; the skin around his eyes still feels a little tight from crying so much last night, but aside from that, his body is loose and relaxed, languid, and he feels like he <em>actually </em>slept for once. Enjoying the sensations of waking up slowly, he snuggles deeper into the soft mattress. </p><p> </p><p>Then the arm under his head shifts, and Tim realizes with a start that it's… not actually his arm. Both of <em>his </em>arms, now that he thinks about it, are curled up against his chest, which means the one around his waist isn’t his, either. And the darkness in front of his eyes is pitch black and soft not because it’s that late-early hour in the morning just before the sun begins to rise, but because it's someone's t-shirt. A distinct feeling of dread curls in Tim's gut.</p><p> </p><p>He can’t tell if Conner is awake yet; his friend is rolling over a little, breath ruffling hot through Tim's hair as he pulls Tim closer so that he's draped halfway over him, crushing Tim into the mattress. Tim's nose gets pushed into Conner's neck as Conner curls the arm that's under Tim's head so that he's not just pillowing Tim's head, but fully cradling it. They had gotten pretty touchy-feely last night, Tim recalls, but this… seems like a little much.</p><p> </p><p>Honestly, though, he's pretty comfortable, and if Conner is still asleep, maybe he'll just lay here a little longer, too. Conner's weight on his ribs is more reassuring than oppressive, and the simple, tactile pleasure of his cheek pressed into Conner's bicep is confirming Tim's long-held suspicion that Kryptonians are weirdly great to cuddle, considering the whole bulletproof, muscles-of-steel thing. He's happy to continue exploring that hypothesis until Conner gives some solid indication of consciousness, so Tim closes his eyes again and says nothing when Conner's arm slides up his back, holding him tightly.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>The second time Tim wakes up, Conner is <em>definitely </em>awake.</p><p> </p><p>“Hi,” he mumbles, voice thick with sleep and still a little raspy from the night before. He blinks into Conner's shockingly bright blue eyes—they’re the same color as the sunny Kansas sky, some helpful corner of Tim's brain informs him—and then he blinks at the empty space in front of him as Conner sits up abruptly. It takes every ounce of Tim's weak, sleepy self-control not to audibly whine at the loss of all of that comfortable warmth, but he sits up too, rubbing his dry eyes with the insides of his wrists.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey,” Conner says, sounding amused as Tim almost immediately drops back to the mattress to perform an elaborate, writhing stretch under the covers, working the heaviness out of his joints. When he's done, he lets the tension go out of his muscles, head flopping to the side as he catches Conner with a serious gaze.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, tell me the truth. Scale of one to ten, how humiliated should I be about last night?” Conner grins crookedly, pulling one arm in front of himself with the other to stretch his shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Eh, maybe like a four? You <em>did </em>pass out mid-flight with a death grip on my shirt, but you didn’t like, wet the bed or confess your undying love for Bart in your sleep or anything.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, that’s fine,” Tim says, waving a hand lazily. “You have best friend privileges, I don’t care unless I do something that ranks above an eight in front of you.”</p><p> </p><p>“Aww, trust!” Conner coos at him, teasing. “You're gonna make me blush.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim lets the arm he had been waving fall across his eyes, just a touch melodramatic. “You suck,” he tells Conner flatly.</p><p> </p><p>“Only for you, baby,” Conner says, and cackles as Tim twists to kick him right off the bed, landing on the floor with a thump and taking most of the blankets with him.</p><p> </p><p>“I can’t believe you're related to Superman,” Tim says plaintively. “You’re awful.”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, I had to get <em>something</em> from Lex. Maybe it was my sense of humor.” Sitting back up, Conner crosses his arms on the edge of the bed and grins at Tim, not sorry in the slightest. Tim rolls over onto his stomach, propping his head up on one hand.</p><p> </p><p>“To my great personal detriment,” Tim informs him. “So, it's Saturday, right? What are we going to do?”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, it's like 11:30, so… You wanna hop in the shower while I do the chores? I’m way late, but I still need to take care of things for Ma. I'll shower after you, and then we can head into town and grab lunch, if you want.”</p><p> </p><p>“Sounds good,” Tim says, smiling as he rolls out of bed. “Thanks for letting me sleep, by the way.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner chuckles, pushing himself up off the floor. Tim realizes that he wore <em>sweatpants </em>to bed in the <em>summer</em>. Freak. “No problem, man. You seemed like you needed it. Don’t you worry, though, the farm'll make you a morning person by the end of the summer.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, just in time for me to go back to patrolling all night. Great,” Tim says, moving to rifle through his bag for jeans and a clean t-shirt.</p><p> </p><p>“A fleeting glimpse of a healthy lifestyle,” Conner agrees. “I’m gonna go feed the cows, they're probably really pissed at me.”</p><p> </p><p>“God forbid,” Tim mutters, heading for the bathroom.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim laughs out loud when he sees Conner's Smallville getup. He looks like a big, slightly sad lump—hair flattened to lay over his forehead, glasses fading the blue of his eyes just a touch, a second t-shirt layered over his Superboy shirt and a short-sleeved flannel over <em>that</em>. It’s honestly a pretty good disguise—the only hint of his impressive musculature is his tanned forearms, and he just looks… really dweeby, in a tall, quietly handsome, farm boy way.  </p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, there's a reason I don’t keep this up around the farm,” he says sourly as he climbs into the driver's seat of Ma's beat up old pickup. Tim is sure the truck was painted a color at some point, but he couldn’t guess what it was. “My self-esteem can only handle so much of this, especially now that I'm also going to be like, the oldest senior in the history of my high school. Life is not glamorous in Smallville, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“I see that,” Tim says, amused and sympathetic as he leans back against the passenger side door to keep observing this new look. Conner starts the truck, the old engine coughing to life and then maintaining a steady rumble at a volume that kind of worries Tim. Maybe he can take a look under the hood for Ma while he's here.</p><p> </p><p>They start up the driveway, jolting along in a way that shouldn’t be as relaxing as it is. Maybe it's just the sight of Conner driving that's distracting him from his worries and turning the roaring engine into pleasant background noise. The visual of it is certainly new to Tim, although Conner seems comfortable, one arm hooked out the window as they wind up the driveway.</p><p> </p><p>“Well,” Tim says, trying to pull his attention back to the conversation, “at least you've only got one more year, right? You said you should finish out next year with enough credits to graduate, and then you can head to Metropolis or San Francisco or wherever and reinvent yourself for college.”  </p><p> </p><p>“It cannot happen soon enough,” Conner confirms, turning onto the two-lane road that leads into town. “I know I've technically been going to high school for a normal amount of time since I missed like a year and a half, but it feels like it's been decades. They had to enroll me as a sophomore since I didn’t finish the year out before I died, so now it's just me hanging out with a bunch of teenagers. So weird.”</p><p> </p><p>“You know you’ve only not been a teenager for like ten days, right?” Tim asks, raising his eyebrows and suppressing a smile. He's happy to let Conner vent—it has to be weird, still trying to finish <em>high school </em>after everything he's been through, and Tim completely understands the awkwardness and stress of trying to maintain a cover that doesn’t really suit you. After all, he’s not exactly at home when he’s playing Timothy Drake-Wayne, smooth and savvy heir apparent to Bruce Wayne’s empire. Still, it’s a little funny to hear him griping about teenagers like some old man.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, that’s long enough when everybody else is seventeen,” Conner says, rolling his eyes. “I was barely allowed to re-enroll, and the principal said if I don’t graduate before I'm twenty-one, she's gonna kick me out. I'll be scraping in just under the wire, barring any <em>new </em>life-threatening emergencies in the next year.”</p><p> </p><p>“You know, you could just drop out and get your GED instead. I would help you study for it, and you could skip straight to college, or whatever else.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner sighs, dropping his hands to the bottom of the steering wheel as the long, straight road passes beneath them, wheat fields and cow pastures blurring on either side. “Yeah, I guess. When I first got back it felt… important, to be as normal as possible, you know? Pretend nothing happened, re-enroll and get my diploma like a normal guy. I'm kind of still processing that nothing about my life is ever going to be normal. I can’t do it like Clark did. Graduate like a nice kid, date your high school sweetheart, go to college, get a job in the big city. It's just never going to work that way.”</p><p> </p><p>“It doesn’t have to,” Tim tells him, frowning. It makes his chest ache to hear Conner still comparing himself to Clark. Conner <em>isn’t </em>Clark, and that's a lot of what Tim has always liked about him. Even though they share the same core of goodness and generosity, Conner is independent and brash and funny, pissed off and sweet and achingly open in a way that Clark could never be, and Tim wishes he would realize that <em>different </em>doesn’t mean <em>less</em>. “You don’t have to be Clark, Conner. Isn’t that the point? You can be whoever you want. You should know by now that your DNA has nothing to do with it.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” Conner says, half-hearted. “The GED wouldn’t really affect the timing at this point, though, so I might as well just finish out at school.” He taps his fingers on the wheel, a nervous little gesture that Tim has never seen before. Tim doesn’t say anything, just watches him curiously, and after a quiet moment, Conner caves.</p><p> </p><p>“I was kind of thinking about trade school, actually,” he confesses, speaking quickly. He clams up again, but Tim leans towards him, eyes intent on Conner and a smile starting to tug at his lips as he rests an arm on the center console.</p><p> </p><p>“Wait, really? That would be pretty cool. What trade?”</p><p> </p><p>“Uh. Carpentry,” Conner says, glancing nervously at Tim. “I told you I've been taking woodworking in school, and I've patched up a couple of things around the barn for Ma. It's kind of nice, building something from scratch, or fixing something broken. It's satisfying, to look at something and know it exists, or it's useable because of you. Like you did something really real, you know?”</p><p> </p><p>“No, I don’t, but that sounds amazing,” he says, totally sincere. “I had never thought about something like that for you, but now that I'm picturing it, it really suits you. You've already got the wardrobe and everything,” he adds, tugging the sleeve of Conner’s flannel with a grin.</p><p> </p><p>“Shut up,” Conner mutters as he turns into the parking lot of a small diner. “I’ll have you know my flannels are very fashionable in Smallville.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh sure, farm boy haute couture. I can totally see it.” Conner makes a face at the uppity tone he uses, and Tim snickers as he gets out of the car. “I mean, you would actually pull it off if you could fix your hair and ditch the six extra shirts, which is kind of impressive.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner, rolling his eyes, opens the door for Tim and follows him into the diner. The air conditioning is blowing icily, and Tim knows instantly that he's going to regret his choice of a thin t-shirt. The diner itself is cute, though—it has that retro vibe that a lot of these places play on lately, but the colors are soft, inviting yellows and blues, and the music isn’t cranked up so loud that you have to shout to hear yourself. Tim can’t tell if they came during the lunch rush or not; a little more than half of the booths are occupied, and there are only a few patrons sitting scattered on the little backless vinyl stools at the counter.  </p><p> </p><p>“I think you're <em>actually</em> making it worse, which is equally impressive. You basically just told me that I'm the 'before' of the ugly best friend transformation sequence in a movie,” Conner tells him sourly, following him in.</p><p> </p><p>“Aww, it's okay. I liked you before you got pretty,” Tim says over his shoulder, and dodges Conner's half-hearted punch to the shoulder with a grin. As they step up to the little hostess station, one of the girls hanging out there smiles at Conner; friendly, but not flirty, Tim notices.</p><p> </p><p>“Hi, Conner. Who's your friend?”</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Sal,” Conner says, smiling back the same way. This is new to Tim—the hostess is cute, and Conner usually flirts with pretty much any girl within earshot. Apparently, the flannels aren’t the only part of his disguise. He hadn’t really thought of Conner as an actor before this; everything about him is so fundamentally honest that it feels strange to see him deliberately washing out his confident, friendly personality to blend in. He's not sure he likes watching Conner fade out like that. “This is my buddy Tim. He's visiting from out of town for a while.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, that's nice,” Sal says, handing him two menus. “I think your usual table is open, you can head back. Nice to meet you, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“You, too,” Tim says, smiling at her and the fact that the hostesses know Conner by name, that he has a <em>usual </em>table. Maybe it’s not all bad; it's different, but kind of charming, thinking of Conner living here day to day, carving out a quiet space for himself in this little town. It stings a little to realize that the constant, complaining phone calls he used to get about life in Smallville before Conner had died have petered out in the last few years—partly because, Conner has confessed, he actually likes it here now, but Tim hasn't exactly been calling to hear about his homework woes lately. It's another reminder of how much he's let pass him by in the haze of lingering grief and fear he's been living in. He'll do better, he promises himself, even once he's back in Gotham.</p><p> </p><p>He follows Conner to a table near the far corner, with worn blue vinyl benches and a good view of the door. “This place seems nice,” Tim says as the door chimes, admitting a young mother with two small children.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I like it here. It's usually quiet, and the food's pretty good,” Conner tells him, handing him one of the menus. “Also, don’t think that conversation is over, you little jerk. Implying that I ever <em>wasn't</em> pretty, the audacity.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim laughs. “All I'm going to say: sunglasses and multiple belts.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, maybe my accessories were questionable, but I <em>looked </em>good. That haircut? The earring? Come on,” he says, looking a little too smug about it.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, the haircut looked good,” Tim acquiesces, glancing over the menu. Ma has been doing her level best to stuff him like a Thanksgiving turkey since he got here, so he's hoping to eat light. Unfortunately, the menu is making him think that's going to be a tall order in Smallville.</p><p> </p><p>“Besides, you wore a leotard and tights. <em>Bright</em> <em>green</em> tights.” Conner's not even looking at the menu, which makes Tim smile despite his costume choices being impugned.</p><p> </p><p>“But wouldn’t you rather I did?” he asks lightly. “I mean, have you ever seen pictures of Dick's old outfit? It was <em>rough</em>. I think half the reason the police resisted cooperating with B for so long was because he let his kid run around dressed like that.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh my god, you made me remember that,” Conner says, pulling a face of sheer horror. “Not that his current outfit, uh. Leaves much to the imagination, either.” He makes a face that's somewhere between disturbed and appreciative, and Tim snorts.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, Dick has always been a show-off. It's the circus training, I think. I'm gonna tell him you've been checking him out, though.”</p><p> </p><p>“Nooo,” Conner whines, dropping his head into his hands with an audible thwack. His voice comes out muffled. “How am I ever supposed to visit the manor if I know that <em>he</em> knows that I think he's hot?”</p><p> </p><p>“Pretty sure he'd be more confused if someone <em>didn’t </em>think he was hot. Besides, isn’t that getting a little ahead of yourself? You've gotta get past the big guy before you worry about things like that.”</p><p> </p><p>A waitress approaches the table, cutting off Conner's next complaint. “Hi, Conner. Usual?” He picks his head up enough to smile and nod at her.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, thanks.”</p><p> </p><p>“And what can I get you, hon?” She turns to Tim, who takes one last, dubious glance at the menu.</p><p> </p><p>He ends up with a grilled chicken sandwich, which Conner makes fun of him for. It’s better than he expects, and he lets Conner eat his fries even though Conner's enormous burger makes him a little jealous. Stupid Kryptonian metabolisms. He figures he’s behaved himself well enough, though, so he eats the whole thing slowly, enjoying the friendly stream of bickering they keep up for the better part of an hour. At some point Tim ends up wearing Conner’s flannel (it’s <em>cold</em>), and Conner gets a sundae for dessert even though it's <em>lunch</em> and tries to convince Tim to eat the maraschino cherry that comes on top.</p><p> </p><p>“Ugh, no. Do you have any idea how many chemicals that thing has been soaked in? Are you <em>trying </em>to give me cancer?”</p><p> </p><p>“Aw come on, you're—”</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Conner!”</p><p> </p><p>Conner stops dangling the cherry in front of Tim's face long enough to look up and give the newcomer a small smile. “Hey, Simon. Where have you been? I haven’t seen you in a while.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, yeah, I've been out of town. I'm back for my niece's christening, but then I'll be gone again til the end of the summer. I got an internship at LexCorp.” <em>That</em> gets Tim's attention. Conner goes a little pale and drops the cherry, leaving a splatter of unnaturally red juice on the table. Twisting in the booth, Tim turns to get a look at the stranger, and Simon wanders closer to the table, seeming to notice Tim. He's a short, scrawny redhead, some sort of digital recorder on a cord around his neck, holding a grease-stained brown to-go bag in one hand.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, hi. I didn’t see you had company, Conner. I'm Simon Valentine, Conner's best friend,” he adds to Tim, sticking his hand out. Tim forces himself to smile as they shake hands.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim Drake. Internship at LexCorp, huh?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, you know. Usually they're only for college students, but my experimental work with frogs got their attention.” Tim raises his eyebrows mildly; across the table, Conner is glancing back and forth between the two of them, twisting the broken cherry stem in his fingers.</p><p> </p><p>“Frogs?” Tim asks. He does <em>not </em>like this guy; claiming to be Conner's best friend with an internship at LexCorp? Even if Simon is totally innocent, the though of Lex's influence worming its way so far into Conner's life is troubling. The more he finds out, the better.</p><p> </p><p>“I’ve been working on creating a device that emits radio waves in a frequency and pattern that stimulates areas of the frogs' brains which will allow me to teach them to obey my commands,” Simon explains, looking proud of himself. Tim's stomach drops. “I also began research into the manipulation of evolutionary triggers, but that's been put on hold. I find the frogs much more promising.”</p><p> </p><p>“Wow,” Tim says. “That sounds impressive.” Across the table, Conner is staring at Tim, looking vaguely nauseous.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks,” Simon says, modest. “By the way, Tim Drake? As in Tim Drake-Wayne, Bruce Wayne's kid? You and Conner know each other?”</p><p> </p><p>“You know your stuff.” Every warning bell in Tim's head is blaring at full volume; he's fighting hard to keep it casual, but he and Conner are going to have a long, long talk sometime very soon. “We met through our families' work. I'm visiting for a while.”</p><p> </p><p>“Huh. Nothing to do with your… part-time job, right, Kent?” Conner really, really looks like he's going to throw up, ashen under the sunkissed Kryptonian complexion and starting to sweat. Tim is going to hurt something.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, nope. Just a pal. We don’t get to hang out much, so….”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, yeah, sure,” Simon says, apparently capable of taking a hint. Tim thanks every deity he can think of, one at a time. “Well, I'll see you around, Conner. Nice meeting you, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“You too, man,” Tim says, trying not to sound like he's gritting his teeth. They sit silently until the bell over the door chimes, and then Conner collapses back into the seat.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh my god,” he moans, pressing his palms over his eyes, at the same time as Tim half-lunges over the table at him, hissing, “Are you fucking kidding me?”</p><p> </p><p>“Listen, man, I didn’t—”</p><p> </p><p>“Stop,” Tim holds up a hand, closing his eyes. Maybe he can pretend that this entire day has been a weird, great, <em>awful </em>dream, and in a minute, he'll wake up alone and groggy on the air mattress in Conner's room. This is how dreams usually go, right? They start out all nice and do the wish-fulfillment thing (is that what this morning had been? He files that thought away for further examination), but the longer they go on, the more likely it is that something will suddenly go horribly wrong, jolting you awake gasping in your bed, leaving you feeling sick and disoriented, too scared to go back to sleep. The more he thinks about it, the more he wishes it were true. “Let's just… pay and get out of here, okay? We obviously need to talk. Privately.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner just nods and follows him up to the counter, where there's a short line. He still looks pale and shaky, and Tim can't imagine how he himself must look—probably not great, considering the glances that Sal is throwing at them from the hostess station. He <em>feels </em>furious, but he's trying to breathe deeply through his nose, lips pressed tightly together. He just needs to focus on getting out quickly so they can talk.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, so did you hear? That break-in?” Three teenage girls are in line in front of them, and Tim eavesdrops remorselessly, needing something to keep him occupied.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, so weird. That kind of thing <em>never </em>happens here. Do you know where it was?”</p><p> </p><p>“Some toy store downtown, I think? Why would anyone break in there?”</p><p> </p><p>“Some dumb local kids, probably. It is kind of scary, though. I guess even in Smallville….” They step up to pay, and the conversation cuts short. Tim's curiosity is piqued, but more out of habit than anything. He'll look it up when they get back; the third girl was probably right about it just being local kids, looking for entertainment and some quick cash. Smallville isn’t a perfect utopia, and he has bigger concerns right now.</p><p> </p><p>At the register, he pulls out his wallet, slaps a fifty on the counter, and turns on his heel. “Keep the change,” he says, and catches Conner's arm, dragging him towards the door.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey—do you want your receipt?” the man at the register calls after him, but Tim just waves a hand and keeps walking, pushing through the heavy glass door. Stepping outside is like walking face-first into a blanket that just came out of the dryer. It's cozy and comforting after the harsh chill of the diner's air conditioning and it actually does make him feel a little better, but climbing back into Ma's truck is like sitting in the middle of a furnace.</p><p> </p><p>Conner heaves himself into the driver’s seat and collapses, his head lolling back over the headrest. “I can't believe that just happened. Holy shit, that could not have gone worse.”  </p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, that was <em>pretty</em> <em>fucking</em> <em>bad</em>, Conner. Is there something you want to tell me?” He doesn’t want to be this angry, but there was so much terrible shit packed into that conversation, he doesn’t even know where to start.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, hey, I did <em>not</em> know he was interning for Luthor, that—I guess he left while I was helping the Titans out a couple of weeks ago? I didn’t hear anything about it, he never told me.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, okay, well that's better, then!” Tim says, falsely bright in a way that he knows is too mean, makes him even more pissed off, this time at himself. “Your 'best friend’, who <em>knows who you are, Conner, what the fuck</em>, runs off while you're busy to secretly intern for Luthor! That seems fine!”</p><p> </p><p>“It’s not like I told him! He just figured it out!” Conner says, brow crumpling. He looks defensive, and Tim can't really blame him, but this puts <em>so much </em>in danger.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” he says, taking a deep breath. “You still look like you're going to puke and I can't have this conversation sitting in this very public parking lot, so get out of the car. I'm driving.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner obeys without a word and they switch seats, driving in tense silence until they pass the edge of town. Tim realizes with quiet despair that the air conditioning in the truck is broken.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright,” Tim says, still gripping the steering wheel so hard it hurts, but starting to get a handle on his temper again. It's only going to make the situation worse if he hurts Conner's feelings. “Can we figure this out?”</p><p> </p><p>“Figure what out?” Conner asks, but the edge in his voice isn’t as sharp anymore. Tim takes a deep breath. They can do this.</p><p> </p><p>“What we're going to do about Simon. I get that he's your 'best friend’, but what he knows is really, really dangerous in a lot of ways, Conner. If he knows that you're Superboy, that means it's possible that he knows who Clark is, too, or could guess, at least. I told him we 'met through our families' work’, and since he knows what he knows, he's probably not going to assume I meant Clark's reporting career. If he suspects it has something to do with you being Superboy, it's not that big of a leap to figuring out who Bruce is, and then my entire family's safety depends on the extremely shaky discretion of an unpowered, untrained, know-it-all teenager from Smallville.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim can feel his blood pressure starting to rise again and pauses to take another careful breath. “Not to mention the implications of his being recruited under unusual circumstances by LexCorp, and the nature of the experiments he's been doing. We can't just ignore all of that, Conner.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, right.” Conner says, sighing and sitting up a little straighter like he's starting to shake off the shock. “Yeah, you're right. First of all, though, he's not my best friend. He's the best friend I have in Smallville; <em>you</em> are my best friend, period.” That drags a small, crooked smile out of Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks,” he murmurs. It does sort of settle something in his gut, hearing that confirmation.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow, you actually were jealous, huh?” Conner grins, observing him, but cuts him off when Tim opens his mouth to object. “The rest of it… yeah, I don’t know, man. I've never really known what to do about it—he told me he had figured it out sometime last year, and he's sort of been hanging around ever since. He likes to think of himself as my sidekick, I guess? I didn’t <em>like </em>it, but it seemed okay before. He did help me out sometimes. Now… I have no idea.”</p><p> </p><p>That hurts to hear. He had no idea this kid even existed—he’s been such a shitty friend since Conner came back. Such a huge breach of privacy, so much to worry about, and Conner had never mentioned any of it. When Tim was having problems, Conner had been there for Tim the whole time—forgiving him, believing in him, helping him, whatever Tim had needed. And Tim… had gone out of his way not to see or talk to Conner <em>except </em>when he had needed him.</p><p> </p><p>Not anymore, though. He's going to make his absence up to Conner, and he's going to start by helping him get this mess under control.</p><p> </p><p>They turn into the driveway of the farm, and as they pull past the fence, Conner's phone makes an odd little dinging sound. Tim blinks as he realizes it's the first three notes of the Wendy the Werewolf Stalker theme song.</p><p> </p><p>“Dork,” he says, smiling, but Conner's face twists up as he looks at whatever is on his phone.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s Simon,” he says, and Tim gets that creeping sense of dread that he had started to think he'd left in Gotham. They’re still a little ways out from the house, but he pulls over to put the truck in park and cuts the engine—he has a feeling he's not going to want to be operating a vehicle for this. “He wants to know if I'm okay and if anything is up—apparently I looked really freaked out at the diner.” Conner looks up at Tim, wide-eyed.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, you kind of did,” Tim tells him. “Shit. If you just try to brush him off, he's going to get even more suspicious, isn’t he?”</p><p> </p><p>“Probably,” Conner says, starting to look panicked again. “He’s a pretty out-there guy. He's observant, and if he thinks something is up, he'll never let it go. What do I tell him?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim's mind races—what excuse is there for their behavior? Tim's presence, Conner's mini-meltdown over what seemed like a perfectly innocent conversation, his awkward dismissal? Conner could just admit that he doesn’t like Simon working for Lex, of course, but it doesn’t explain his reaction to Simon identifying Tim, and Tim's not sure how much of Superboy's background Simon knows, or how much they want him to know. It's possible that he hasn’t made the connection to Clark yet, and even if he has, Luthor's status as an enemy of Superman is kept thoroughly hidden from the public. Not to mention that if there's something nefarious going on there, Tim doesn’t want to raise any alarms, <em>especially </em>if Simon is willingly involved.</p><p> </p><p>“Tell him we're dating,” Tim says before he can talk himself out of it. Conner's head jerks up from where he had gone back to frowning at the message.  </p><p> </p><p>“Sorry?” he says, like he thinks he didn’t hear Tim right.</p><p> </p><p>“Tell him we're dating,” Tim repeats. “It covers everything, Conner. After all, there's no public reason for me to be here in the first place. What obnoxious, rich, young businessman with a famous dad drops everything to spend an entire summer on a <em>farm </em>with someone he's 'just pals' with? If we're dating, it explains why I'm here in the first place, right?” Conner nods slowly, tentatively, like he's not sure he wants to hear the rest of the explanation.</p><p> </p><p>“It also gives you a good reason to have freaked out so bad. For one thing, we can say that I don’t know you're Superboy yet, which will help draw his attention further away from the idea of either of our families being involved in superhero business. For another, 'secretly dating a guy’ would be a pretty good reason for both of us to be acting weird and keeping things quiet. If we tell him I'm not out to Bruce yet, that covers why Bruce told the press I'm travelling internationally yesterday even though I said our families know each other. If Bruce doesn’t even know I'm here, then there’s no conspiracy about the Waynes covering anything up, and the only secrets we're keeping are from our families, not Simon.” Tim keeps his eyes on Conner, but he's just sitting silently, absorbing all of the angles that Tim is throwing at him. Wrapping up, Tim leans forward, hoping desperately that Conner isn’t about to open the door and fly out of the truck in disgust.</p><p> </p><p>“It leaves him nothing to investigate, but it gives you a reason to ask him to keep his mouth shut, and even if he doesn’t, it's a lot easier for us to run damage control on 'secretly dating' than 'secretly vigilantes'. Your relationship with Simon stays stable, it keeps him from snooping because he feels like he knows the big secret, and it explains away any social weirdness.”</p><p> </p><p>“...Shit,” Conner says, staring sort of blankly at a spot somewhere over Tim's shoulder. “I wish that didn’t make so much sense.”</p><p> </p><p>“We have to give him something big enough that he feels like he figured out something important, and 'my friend has a famous dad and doesn’t know my secret identity' may or may not explain away why you looked like you were about to pass out, especially since at least one of your friends here already knows your secret. If you can think of something better, I'm open to suggestions, but I <em>cannot </em>risk the safety of my family, Conner.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner shakes his head, finally making eye contact with Tim again. It makes something in Tim's gut uncurl, that Conner can still look him in the eye after Tim has made such a wild proposal. “No, you're right. It's a good excuse, and even if I <em>could </em>think of something better, it would take me days, which we don’t have.”</p><p> </p><p>“If you're not comfortable with it, I can come up with something else,” Tim starts, backpedaling. Now that Conner is actually agreeing to it, he's starting to realize how <em>weird </em>this could get. Is it really something they want to subject their friendship to? Conner cocks his head, reminding Tim of Krypto in a way that makes him want to smile despite the situation.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m cool with it. I mean, if I'm gonna pretend to date any dude, I’d probably pick you. We're already best friends, and that's not <em>that </em>different. Especially since we're still supposed to be in the closet anyway, right?”</p><p> </p><p>“I… I guess so, yeah.” Tim's pretty sure it <em>is </em>different, very different, but he doesn’t really have much to back it up. After all, once he and Steph had broken up, they had ended up staying really good friends, right? It feels like a huge leap to Tim, but maybe Conner is more right that he thinks. “We probably won’t have to actually do any… dating stuff. We can just hang out. We might not even see Simon again, if he's going back to Metropolis for his internship. Maybe it'll just blow over. You can tell him we broke up at the end of the summer.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, it'll be fine,” Conner agrees, nodding decisively. A little of his confidence seems to be coming back, which is nice to see.</p><p> </p><p>He types for a minute, chews on his bottom lip, holds the phone out to Tim. Skimming over what he's written, Tim nods, and Conner sends the text.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Across town, Simon Valentine blinks down at his phone. “Conner's gay?”</p><p> </p><p>His sister looks up from the couch where she's feeding her baby.</p><p> </p><p>“Huh?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim is equal parts detective and bisexual catastrophe.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello again! Really not sure about this one, especially the second half. I've never tried to write anything like this before, so... let me know if you hate it lol?? I'm definitely experimenting! Enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Conner? Can I talk to you for a minute?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim is sitting at the kitchen table proof-reading one of Conner's essays, and Conner has just come in from taking out the trash when Ma pulls him aside. Tim watches curiously as Ma begins speaking softly to Conner, but gives them their privacy in favor of returning to marking up Conner's paper on the old laptop in front of him, fixing stray commas and making suggestions. When he glances back up a few minutes later, Conner is shaking his head furiously, posture defensive, and Ma is frowning at him.</p><p> </p><p>“What was that about?” Tim asks quietly as Conner collapses in the chair across from him, running one hand over his face. Ma retreats upstairs with a basket of laundry on her hip.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, Simon definitely didn’t keep his mouth shut. Ma wanted to let me know she supports us, but was disappointed that she had to find out from Mary Ellen at the grocery store this morning.”</p><p> </p><p>“Wow,” Tim says, blinking. “They aren’t kidding about small-town gossip. It's been what, twenty-four hours?”</p><p> </p><p>“She’s also disappointed that the rumors aren’t true,” Conner adds, half amused and half annoyed. “She wants to see me getting back out there after Cassie, and you're a good young man.”</p><p> </p><p>That gets a fond little chuckle out of Tim. “Well, at least you know she's in your corner. Honestly, you might need her, considering how fast that got out.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner sighs, running a hand through his hair. It sticks up at odd angles, and Tim resists the urge to fix it for him. “Yeah. This is gonna make Smallville a whole different experience, isn’t it?”</p><p> </p><p>It twists Tim's heart. The Kents had just been trying to do something nice for him, giving him a place far away from Gotham where he could relax for the summer, and now he's brought <em>this </em>down on their family. On Conner, in particular, who's already been through enough. He's finally found a home in Smallville, however much he might gripe about having to cover up his natural charms, and Tim might have just ruined it for him.</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe,” Tim says, staring down at his keyboard. “I'm sorry, Conner. It was my idea, my fault. I should have tried harder to come up with a better excuse.”</p><p> </p><p>“Dude, the cover story wasn’t the problem. We both agreed it was a good idea, and I still think it is. What else could we have said that wouldn’t have been majorly complicated and suspicious? The only problem here is Simon being a punk who can’t keep a secret.</p><p> </p><p>“Besides, it's not like I'm the first queer kid in Smallville. There's a GSA at the high school and everything. I just wasn’t planning to tell people like this. Or at all, since it's really none of their business.” He shrugs, weirdly calm about it, and Tim's brain whirs a little.</p><p> </p><p>“Are you?” he asks, and immediately wants to take it back.</p><p> </p><p>“What, queer?” Conner doesn’t seem bothered by the question, and Tim nods, unable to take his eyes off his friend. “Yeah, I guess so. I don’t usually think of it that way, but I'm just into who I'm into, so I guess that makes me… I dunno, bi? Not straight. Whatever. I'm the half-alien clone of a superhero and a supervillain, living a double life as a small-town farm boy. It's not exactly at the top of my list of identity crises.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense,” Tim says, trying to kick his brain back into gear. It's sort of idling right now in a way that he's not used to, and he's not quite sure why. After all, he knows plenty of people who don't pin themselves as straight or cisgender. There had a bit of a learning curve when he was younger, but he fully supports them, and his friends all feel the same—attending Pride in San Francisco is always a highlight of the year for the Teen Titans. Any unfortunate influences from his parents’ social circles are long behind him, so of course it doesn’t matter to him what Conner is or isn’t.</p><p> </p><p>Maybe it’s just that he’s now realizing, as it dawns on him that maybe it's odd that he didn't even know his best friend wasn't straight, that he's never really spent a lot of time thinking about his <em>own</em> sexuality, either. Stephanie had given him pause when they were younger, but other than that, it's just never been an important part of his life—not that he's not interested, but there have always been more pressing things to focus on, whether it was school or Robin or the seemingly endless string of tragedies that have marred the last three years of his life. He figures he's attracted to girls, although it's been a long time since he felt anything like that. He's never had much occasion to consider his feelings about men beyond a vague, passing appreciation that tipped him off that he probably wasn’t <em>entirely</em> straight, but now that he's having this conversation, with <em>Conner</em>, of all people….</p><p> </p><p>Well.</p><p> </p><p>It occurs to him very suddenly, with the force and accompanying physical sensations of a fist to the gut, that maybe his deep, complicated emotional relationship with Conner hasn’t been entirely platonic in a long, long time. The thought is equal parts thrilling and terrifying, sending his stomach fluttering and flipping and landing somewhere in his throat, and he has absolutely no idea what to do with it.</p><p> </p><p>“…m? Buddy? Where'd you go?” Conner is waving a hand in front of Tim's face, and Tim blinks rapidly as he comes back to himself. “I lost you for a minute. You good?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, no, I'm… I'm fine. Thanks for talking to me about it,” he says, digging up a smile and hoping Conner doesn’t call him on the way his heart suddenly picks up pace. “I support you, by the way. Obviously.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner snorts. “Oh, thank god. I was so worried you wouldn’t.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim smiles warmly at him, more genuine this time, and drags his eyes back down to his proofreading, starting to tap away steadily at the laptop again. Conner gets up to putter around the kitchen, and Tim can hear him pulling out the fixings for sandwiches. He's hyper-conscious of how <em>domestic </em>the whole thing is now, heat prickling at the back of his neck, and he still kind of feels like he’s going to throw up, because he can’t think of a single thing he’d rather be doing.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, wait, hold up. Let me make sure I'm getting all this: you almost blew your secret identity, came up with <em>fake dating </em>as a cover story, and <em>then </em>figured out your huge, obvious gay crush on him?”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, Steph, I know how it sounds. You don’t have to rub it in,” Tim says, miserable. He pushes a rock over with the toe of his shoe as he stands hunched in the shade near the side of the barn, where he’d retreated to make his panicked phone call.</p><p> </p><p>“How it <em>sounds</em>?” Steph demands. Her tone is indignant, although Tim's not entirely sure what horse she has in this race. “What about how it <em>is</em>? You're supposed to be smarter than <em>Batman</em>, Tim, what the hell were you doing?”</p><p> </p><p>“Stephanie, have you ever seen Bruce try to have an emotion?” This gives her pause.</p><p> </p><p>“…Alright, fine. So, you're an emotionally constipated, slow-motion train wreck.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Steph.”</p><p> </p><p>“So, what are you gonna do about it?”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>What Tim's going to do about it is, apparently, his level best to forget it ever happened. Bruce would be proud.</p><p> </p><p>Instead, he throws himself into the closest things he can find to his usual work, because, he’s discovering, it's the only coping mechanism he has. He calls Barbara and asks her to dig up anything and everything she can on Simon Valentine, and reads every article he can find about the break-in he'd heard the girls at the diner mention. Which is just the one, really, published in the Smallville Ledger, stating that it occurred Thursday night and nothing was stolen. It strikes Tim as just odd enough that he wants to investigate, and he makes a note of the store's address in his phone.</p><p> </p><p>He also asks Conner if he can help with any of the chores around the farm, a decision he regrets almost immediately, and not for the reasons he would expect. What Kon shows him how to do is mostly feeding animals, which is easy and actually kind of fun in the case of the chickens. The problem is that it also means watching Conner <em>interact </em>with animals, and the way he grins playfully at the chickens and soothes the more anxious cows, stroking their soft noses and speaking gently to them, is a little much for Tim's fragile heart at the moment.</p><p> </p><p>It should <em>not </em>make his stomach jump and his heart skip to see Conner being nice to animals. It's ridiculous, he tells himself firmly as he pours pellets into the little troughs in the chicken pen, watching the chickens wander up to it, clucking and pecking. First of all, it's basic human decency, and last time he checked, his bar was set a little higher than that. Secondly, he's pretty sure he's not seven anymore, and what he's feeling right now reminds him an awful lot of what he can now acknowledge was a huge crush on Superman when he was a child. Which—actually? Maybe he should have seen this coming.</p><p> </p><p>Shaking his head, he starts scattering Ma's kitchen scraps from the day on the floor of the pen as the chickens start to finish up the pellets. There are enough chickens in the pen that Tim has to work to distribute the scraps evenly, trying to be fair and make sure they all get a little. Ma had said he could just dump the bucket and let them sort it out, but he needs the distraction right now anyway, so he becomes the arbiter of chicken justice, tossing bits farther from the bossier hens in hopes that the shy ones will get something.</p><p> </p><p>He's just not entirely sure how he's going to make it through the summer now. He can’t ask to go back—it’s only been four days, which means it would be a huge insult to Ma's hospitality, and everyone in both families would be disappointed in him in a way that would be hard to bear. He can just picture Bruce and Alfred and <em>Cass</em> fixing him with pointed, mournful gazes, silently reminding him that he's a terrible child who can’t even be <em>helped </em>right.</p><p> </p><p>Now, he <em>could</em> just ask to move to the couch downstairs, make up some excuse about Conner snoring, but… if he's honest with himself, he doesn’t want to. Of course, that's the whole problem in the first place, and maybe it would be more respectful of Conner to ask to move, but he also doesn’t want to raise his suspicions. He's been acting weird enough already in the last twelve hours, zoning out and jumping when Conner rouses him, staring, <em>blushing. </em>It's awful, and Tim absolutely cannot let Conner figure out what's going on, so. The air mattress remains.</p><p> </p><p>Tim can’t quite stand it anymore, though, so once Conner is asleep, he shimmies his jeans back on, ties his shoelaces together, and drapes his sneakers backwards around his neck as he lifts the window further open and levers himself silently out over the sill. He knows there's a small decorative piece of trim wrapped around the house about six feet down from the window, extending from the bottom of the porch roof and providing a ledge just wide enough the balance on the balls of his feet. He pauses there for a minute, considering whether to try to edge his way to the overhang above the porch or just use the ledge to drop the last eight feet or so to the ground. Conner's head pops out of the window above him, rubbing one eye sleepily, and Tim's grip on the windowsill tightens convulsively.</p><p> </p><p>“What are you doing?” he hisses, and Conner just stares at him.</p><p> </p><p>“…Seriously? You're asking <em>me </em>that?” Tim sighs, shifting impatiently. Stretched with his arms above his head between the window and the ledge isn’t exactly a comfortable position to be stuck in, and the ledge is starting to dig into his feet through his socks.</p><p> </p><p>“I wanted to go check out that break-in, okay? Go back to bed.”</p><p> </p><p>“So, your plan is to… <em>walk</em> four miles into town, at quarter past midnight, to look at a crime scene, without any of your gear. Right. I remember now why everyone lauds you as a genius.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, listen, I'm not going to keep hanging here forever, so—”</p><p> </p><p>Conner floats out the window in his sweatpants and T-shirt and lifts Tim easily off the side of the house, holding him around the waist. Tim tries not to visibly die inside.  </p><p> </p><p>“You could have just asked for a ride, you know. Although big, bad, and batty is going to kill me very slowly if he finds out I helped you work while you were on <em>vacation. </em>Then how am I supposed to try Alfred's scones?” The look he gives Tim is somewhere between resigned and betrayed. Tim struggles to think about literally anything other than what’s currently happening, <em>particularly </em>his torso pressed snugly against Conner's, as they take off toward town.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s not even work, this is more like… I don’t know, tourism or something. Small town crime, no Jokers or Penguins, change of pace.”</p><p> </p><p>“Remind me to never take a vacation with you. A crime scene is your version of tourism? That's like, the most morbid thing I've ever heard. No wonder you're so stressed out.”</p><p> </p><p>“I'm not stressed out,” Tim says, petulant. He's almost glad he's being carried, because his arm tucked against Conner’s shoulder means he doesn’t have the range of motion to cross his arms like a complete child. Conner just snorts.</p><p> </p><p>“Right, no, <em>you</em>? Never.” He knocks his jaw lightly against Tim’s temple as he starts to slow down, drifting to a stop in the still, empty streets of Smallville. They're one street behind the high school, touching down between two houses a few doors down from the store that was broken into. “You can’t bullshit me about <em>that</em>. I can hear your heartbeat, remember?”</p><p> </p><p>“I told you to stop that,” Tim says, stepping away quickly and trying not to read into what had almost felt like a squeeze of his waist before Conner released him. He unties his shoelaces and shoves his feet in his sneakers, breathing very carefully to bring his heartbeat back into line.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s kind of hard not to hear when you're right here,” Conner tells him, shrugging. “I can pick you out when I'm at the Tower and you're in Gotham. Clark told me he can actually hear Lois and Ma from anywhere in the world, even if he's underground or something.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim stops to stare at him. The bit about Clark piques his interest, but he files the part about himself away in a growing folder in his brain that he's titled Things I'm Not Thinking About Right Now<em>, </em>Possibly Ever. “That’s weird. Is it <em>loud</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner tilts his head back as they head towards the street, considering the question. “Not really? I don’t know how to describe it. It's not like it drowns out other sounds, and I can kind of tune in or out of it if someone is far away. I can find Cassie and Bart that way, too, but since they're a couple hundred miles away right now, I have to check for them on purpose to hear them. But when someone is right in front of me, it's pretty much always there with the other background noise. It's like crickets in summer, or leaves rustling.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s… very poetic,” Tim says, fighting back a fond smile and mostly failing. Conner glances down at him and smiles back.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m not just some dumb jock, you know. I'm <em>sensitive</em>,” he informs Tim, putting on an uppity tone that's ruined by the grin he can’t keep off his face. Tim laughs at him, elbowing him gently.</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t believe you, you lug.”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, it's true. It's not all high romance, though, trust me. I can also hear, like, people's food digesting.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim wrinkles his nose. “Ew,” he says eloquently. Conner laughs quietly as they come to a halt at the police tape perimeter that's still up outside the toy shop. Well, Conner halts, at least. Tim keeps walking, ducking casually under the tape like he does it every day. He hears Conner sigh behind him, but doesn’t look back.</p><p> </p><p>He pauses when he reaches the closed door; in jeans and his soft sleep shirt with no gloves and no utility belt, he's not exactly well-equipped to push the plywood aside and climb through the shattered front window, and since Conner is with him, he has a better alternative anyway. He gestures at the door, and Conner, floating silently up beside him, gives him a look, but the door clicks softly open after a minute. Kon’s TTK is always better than Tim's lock-picking set at home, and Tim spares a second to hope sincerely that the store will rely on more than a locked front door for security in the future.</p><p> </p><p>Inside, the store's main floor is a mess—several of the shelves have been knocked over, and most of the inventory is on the floor, chaotic piles of stuffed animals, building sets, and baby toys tossed haphazardly. It’s difficult to tell if anything was actually taken, although the police report mentioned nothing stolen. The register is open and empty, but Tim can’t see any signs that it’s been forced, so he figures the owners must have at least had the sense not to leave it stocked overnight.</p><p> </p><p>As they wander into the back rooms, he notices that the safe doesn’t appear to have been touched at all, closed with the dial set at zero and the stacks of paperwork still pristine atop it where it sits bolted to the floor. The storefront makes it seem unlikely that this was a true professional covering their tracks; it could be that this really was just some neighborhood kids and they got lazy and gave up on the cash, but the oddity of the contrast puts Tim on slightly higher alert.</p><p> </p><p>There’s not much more to take stock of here—the building seems to have been a residential house converted for business, and the upstairs is nothing special, mostly extra inventory and office supplies that show no signs of having been touched by the robbers. Downstairs is a little stock room, the office he already checked, and a bathroom. It’s hardly anything to go on, and Tim figures they’re just about done here. Really not much to see, and the store will probably just file an insurance claim and move on, but his training compels him to be thorough regardless of how petty the crime seems.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner,” Tim calls softly, and his companion drifts down the stairwell, looking sleepy and a little bored. “One last thing. Could you unlock this for me?” He gestures to the back door, and Conner touches down briefly, lowering one foot to the floor. He stares at the door for a second, then looks at Tim and shrugs.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s already open,” he says, and swings the door slowly inward to demonstrate. Tim steps out of the way, frowning, and sticks his head out into the night, looking around. There’s a bare patch of packed dirt with a small dumpster to the left. A chain-link fence, maybe eight feet high, a few shrubs, and a stretch of dirt that looks like it might be used for running laps separate the toy store’s back lot from the athletic fields of the high school. Narrowing his eyes, Tim steps through the door, gesturing without looking behind him for Conner to follow.</p><p> </p><p>To his right, Tim can see a few trees that grow denser and turn into something more like a forest as they extend to the right, stretching around nearly the entire perimeter of Smallville High’s athletic fields. Stepping up to the fence, he pauses and glances around. Conner is hovering just outside the threshold of the store, the back door still open behind him.</p><p> </p><p>“Can you lock the front door and close that one? Then come back here, I need your help.” Conner obeys silently, apparently having resigned himself to whatever mission Tim is on. When he returns a minute later, Tim gestures towards the top of the fence. “Give me a boost? I want to check something at the top.”</p><p> </p><p>“This is definitely starting to seem like actual work,” Conner says quietly, sounding disgruntled. “We’re talking about this later.”</p><p> </p><p>“Mhm,” Tim says, nodding absently. His eyes are still locked on the top of the fence, and even Conner’s hands around his waist, pulling him up nearly four feet off the ground, aren’t enough to break him out of the intense focus that’s come over him. Once he’s got a better view, Tim risks pulling out his phone and using the flashlight to illuminate the dirty old metal bar that runs across the top of the fence, cupping his hand around the light to minimize the chances of being caught. It takes him a minute, nudging Conner to one side of the fence and then the other until he finds what he’s looking for. Where one of the vertical poles that creates the structure of the fence is attached to the top bar with a loop of metal, there are two little scraps of black fiber, one caught under the loop, the other on one of the diamonds of the chain link that poke over the edge of the fence. Tim remembers Conner mentioning that there had been a been a bad storm the night before he arrived, that half the town’s fields had nearly flooded—these airy little tufts wouldn’t have survived a downpour like that.</p><p> </p><p>“You find something?” Conner asks, and Tim hums, still lost in thought.</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe. It looks like someone hopped this fence recently, but I can’t think of a reason why <em>that</em> would be their escape route. Getting away from an attempted robbery by running across an open field? It does kind of reek of drunk teenagers. I mean, even Smallville has more than one police car; it would have taken so long to get across the field and around the school that it would have been easy to cut them off, and it would have put them at much higher risk of being spotted by a neighbor—someone was close enough to hear the glass shattering and report it, after all. If it was someone who wanted more than just a thrill, this alley leaves plenty of room in both directions to stick close to a house, maintain cover, and make a much cleaner break.”</p><p> </p><p>Turning off the light, Tim leans back a little in Conner’s grasp and makes a last, quick survey when he spots one more oddity. Narrowing his eyes, Tim points beyond the fence. “Can you see that?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner rolls his eyes and just hauls them both up over the fence, setting Tim back down on the other side. Glancing between the fence and what he had pointed to, Tim frowns. “I wanted to say it was just some dumb kids after all, breaking into a toy store and making a run for it across the high school’s fields for fun. But if that’s the case, how did they manage <em>this</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Crouching, he points to a large, heavy boot print in the dirt on the other side of the fence—it’s three feet to the right and nearly eight feet out from where the shreds of fabric were caught at the top of the fence, pointed somewhere between the school and the trees. “Obviously doesn’t belong to a jogger, and no teenage troublemaker made a leap like that off that fence. None of the bushes back there are disturbed in the slightest, either. Unless Smallville has a secret gang of professional parkour athletes pulling off B-and-Es for the thrill of it, this doesn’t make any sense.”</p><p> </p><p>“So…?” Conner asks, raising an eyebrow at him.</p><p> </p><p>“I… don’t know. I don’t see any other footprints like this one, so there’s no way of telling where they went from here.” Pushing to his feet, Tim squints at the dirt, annoyed. A break-in in Smallville shouldn’t be this complicated. “It doesn’t look like they even tried to take anything, and if they were after money, why would they hit <em>here</em>? There's no motive for a professional, and it was so sloppy. But considering this, they obviously had skills that don’t line up with the whole ‘local teens' theory. I don’t know where that leaves us. Something more personal, maybe?”</p><p> </p><p>“So… probably something we have no way of figuring out right now. Sounds like a dead end. So, are you good to go now? Your appetite for mystery satisfied?” Tim realizes that he sounds just a touch impatient, and has for the last five or ten minutes. Now that he’s reached a conclusion, albeit a particularly frustrating one, he’s back in reality all at once and feeling guilty. Turning to look at Conner, he hopes the apology is clear enough on his face for Conner to read it.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah. I’m sorry for keeping you out for so long; I really did mean to come by myself.” Conner just extends an arm to him, and Tim steps into his grasp, taking a second to carefully regulate his breathing as Conner pulls him close and picks them up off the ground. It's ridiculous—they’ve done this literally hundreds of times and it's never meant anything, but since his badly-timed revelation yesterday, Conner's arm around his waist and his side pressed into Tim's are playing havoc with his feelings. As they rise up over the rooftops again, Tim channels his inner Bruce and pictures cramming all of those feelings into a tiny jar, which he then mentally sets on fire. It doesn’t make the weird, buoyant feeling behind his solar plexus go away.  </p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, like I’m gonna let you wander off in the middle of the night alone to die in a cornfield or something. Just do me a favor and don’t make it a habit, okay? I’m still half-human, I do actually <em>need</em> sleep. At least wait for a weekend.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll try,” Tim says, and he means it and he <em>is</em> sorry, but it’s hard to feel too terrible when there’s so much patience and accepting under Conner’s exasperation. He’s a really good friend, and Tim doubles down on his determination to squash this absurd crush and focus on being the same for Conner.</p><p> </p><p>That feeling lasts for the full ten minutes that it takes them to make their way back to the farm, gliding over wheat and corn and patches of tomatoes and beans, at which point Conner gets them in the window, bypasses the air mattress entirely, and drops Tim directly in his bed. The panic is instantaneous.</p><p> </p><p>“Um,” he says, and Conner shakes his head, dropping down beside him.</p><p> </p><p>“You obviously can’t be trusted, so I’m keeping an eye on you. We are <em>both</em> going to sleep.” A blanket throws itself over Tim, courtesy of Kon’s TTK, and Tim’s mind races.</p><p> </p><p>“Can I at least change first? Pretty sure you don’t want my sneakers in your bed all night.” Conner waves a hand at him, obviously already half-asleep, and Tim crawls back out of the bed, his whole body thrumming with adrenaline and relief. He collapses onto the air mattress, kicking off his shoes and wriggling his way back out of his jeans, exchanging them for his usual sleep shorts. By the time he’s done, Conner is already snoring, and Tim, grateful, stays put on the floor, stretching out and staring at the ceiling as he tries to calm the strangled shouting sound that’s rattling around his skull. He doesn’t get much sleep.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Listen I know plenty of people think SF Pride is corporate bullshit but THAT'S WHERE TITANS TOWER IS, take it up with Cyborg. Also Tim's thoughts on his sexuality are basically identical to my own thoughts on mine, so I'm essentially writing him as bi and demisexual, because I love to project onto Tim lol. </p><p>Anyway, would be interested to hear if this chapter worked for people or not, feel free to let me know! No pressure tho.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim and Conner eat some ice cream and talk about their feelings.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello and welcome to my thesis on hand-holding apparently?? I've eaten through my buffer of chapters already so you're getting this without the benefit of a couple weeks of editing lol, hopefully it still holds up! Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Conner has school the next morning, which is a relief to Tim. He wakes up alone in Conner's room to early morning sun streaming in the window; apparently Conner’s threat about turning him into an early riser had been real. Something about how bright the light is without his usual blackout curtains keeps him awake even when he drags the sheets over his head and tries to go back to sleep, like the sun has short circuited all of the hard-earned night owl wiring in his brain, and although he doesn’t feel particularly well-rested, he concedes consciousness and drags himself up to throw on a t-shirt and a pair of athletic shorts. Between the time off and the sheer quantity that he’s been eating since he got to the farm, he's already starting to feel the lack of exercise. It’s a simultaneously sluggish and jittery feeling that definitely doesn’t have anything to do with either his multiple sleepless nights <em>or</em> his crush on Conner.  </p><p> </p><p>So he heads down the porch steps and up the driveway, easing from a walk into a jog before hitting a steady pace, running in open, easy strides until all he can feel is the expansion and contraction of his lungs and tense-and-release rhythm of his legs pumping beneath him. He's never actually been much of a runner, but it's an activity he can do without talking to anyone or thinking about anything, and that's really all he wants right now.  </p><p> </p><p>He runs until he hits the outskirts of Smallville proper, then turns around and runs most of the way back. By the time he makes it back to the farm, he's drenched in sweat and the tips of his ears are bright red, his nose and cheeks a pink that has nothing to do with the exertion. Even the morning sun here is strong enough to burn—he’s so used to the perpetual overcast of Gotham, he hadn’t even thought about sunscreen. He's sure Conner will get a laugh out of that, so at least it'll be good for something.</p><p> </p><p>Once he showers and changes, he's tired, but in a better mood. He plays boring, human fetch for a while in the front yard with Krypto, who somehow manages to give him a pitying look every time he throws the ball and seems to bring it back with a sort of resigned tolerance. Ma finds him eventually, coming back in from watering the young vegetable garden on the side of the house.</p><p> </p><p>“Hi, Tim. Enjoying the weather?” He smiles up at her, throwing the ball again and watching as Krypto trots off after it, pretending to make an effort.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, it's great out here. Don’t tell Conner I said so, but I think I'm gonna miss the sun when I head back to Gotham.” Ma laughs and makes her way past him up to the porch, picking up a watering can and giving the baskets on the railing a drink before taking a seat on the two-person rocker that hangs on heavy ropes from the porch overhang.</p><p> </p><p>“Will you, now? Anything else you're going to miss?” The look she gives him is gentle, but also sort of terrifyingly knowing. Tim blushes and goes cold at the same time, which doesn’t really seem like it should be possible.</p><p> </p><p>“Um,” he says, and Krypto's cool nose bumping against his hand as he brings the ball back isn’t quite enough to comfort Tim. Ma just smiles at him, warm and understanding, and shakes her head.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s alright, dear. It's really none of my business, and I won’t stick my nose where it doesn’t belong. You're a good young man, though, and you deserve to take this time to relax. I can see that you're tired—don’t let something like this tie you up in knots all summer, alright? It doesn’t help to worry too much about something natural.”</p><p> </p><p>“Um, right. Thanks, Ma.” He smiles at her, awkward but genuine, and she stands up and pats him on the shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Any time, dear. Would you like to help me make lemonade?” Tim is deeply grateful for the easy escape she gives him, and he doesn’t mind the distraction of methodically cutting and juicing the lemons, either. He's happy to do just about anything to keep his mind busy right now, and his options are limited without any work to do or patrols to run. Instead, he channels as much of his attention as he can on the simple tasks Ma gives him; lemonade has never been made with such intense focus and care.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, people definitely know,” Conner tells him when he comes home, dropping his backpack on a kitchen chair.</p><p> </p><p>“Was it bad?” Tim asks, tentative. If people are giving Conner shit because of him, he's going to feel terrible pretty much forever. Conner just shrugs, dropping his glasses on the table and stripping out of his button down. Tim works really, really hard not to react to that.</p><p> </p><p>“Not really. I mean, it was better for it to happen now than in the fall since people will be used to it by the time everyone is around to bug me about it, but it wasn’t a huge deal. The kids who don’t like me anyway were assholes, but people just wanted to know who you are, mostly—Smallville’s more nosy than mean, I guess. And I got an invitation to the GSA.”</p><p> </p><p>“Are you going to join?” Tim asks, smiling expectantly at him. Conner grins as he starts unpacking his books.</p><p> </p><p>“Nah. They might get a visit from Superboy come next semester, though.” Tim laughs and sits down across from Conner as he settles in to start his homework. It seems like Conner has shrugged off any lingering irritation with Tim over last night, which Tim is glad to see.</p><p> </p><p>Picking up Conner's copy of The Old Man and the Sea, Tim starts reading for lack of anything better to do at the moment. He'd had mixed feelings about the book when he first read it, but he's finding it comforting to re-read, leafing through slowly while he waits for Conner to hit a roadblock in his homework or ask a question. He remembers having trouble swallowing the ending when he was younger, the idea of working so hard for something and the creeping realization that you'll end your journey with nothing to show for it too painful to bear. Now, he finds the concept perfectly understandable—relatable, even. He's not sure he likes the implication, and puts the book back down without finishing it, feeling a little queasy.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, hey—you wanna go on a date Wednesday night?”</p><p> </p><p>“I—what?” Tim blinks, his brain stuttering at trying to shift gears that hard that fast. Melancholy self-pity to flat panic in three-point-five. He's suddenly sort of grateful for his sunburn.</p><p> </p><p>He's not sure what his face is doing, but Conner laughs. “My friend wants to meet you—she’s in summer school, too. She works at an ice cream shop in town a couple nights a week, so. Date?”</p><p> </p><p>“Um. Yeah, sure,” Tim says, trying to remember how to breathe slowly. He can’t look Conner in the eye, and he’s definitely fidgeting. “That sounds good.”</p><p> </p><p>“Cool. Can you check my work on this?” He shoves a trigonometry worksheet across the table towards Tim, and Tim tries not to make his sigh of relief too obvious.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim has his game face on. How, precisely, he’s gotten to a point in his life where he needs his “game face” to hang out and eat ice cream with his best friend he’s still not entirely sure, but this is where he’s at, and he's working with it. Rumbling into town in Ma’s old truck, Conner parks in an empty lot that’s been left for public use and leads Tim over and up a few blocks until they hit Main Street. It’s a cute little area, looking newer than Tim would have expected in Smallville—Conner confesses as they walk that he’s had to rebuild most of it at least once in the last year or two.</p><p> </p><p>A few blocks down from the ice cream shop, a man steps out of a store in front of them and turns to lock it. Conner smiles when he sees him.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Charlie!” he calls, friendly and relaxed. The man turns to him as he finishes locking up; he’s a nondescript man in his late forties or early fifties, slight beer belly and hair thinning on top, and he smiles broadly when he sees them.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Conner! How’s your Ma?” He reaches out a hand and they shake heartily. Tim almost wants to laugh about how sweetly quaint the whole thing is—nobody is ever this friendly in Gotham, and he’s still getting used to the small-town neighborliness that seems to come naturally to people here.</p><p> </p><p>“She’s doing well, thanks. How’ve you been?”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, can’t complain. Business has picked up a little since the place was rebuilt, actually—guess people like the new look better. My wife’s designer friend in Star City helped me out with it.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s great to hear, Charlie. Good to—”</p><p> </p><p>“Now, hold on just a second, Conner. Are you going to run off without introducing me? Is this your young man I’ve been hearing about?”  He turns to smile at Tim, and Tim doesn’t have to fake his embarrassment, cursing his pasty complexion as heat rises to his face. Doing his best to summon up a smile for Charlie, who seems genuinely interested, he glances at Conner, waiting for a cue. Conner makes a surprised little sound and reaches out to put a hand on Tim’s shoulder, gentler than his usual friendly clap.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, right, sorry. Tim, this is Charlie, the best barber in Smallville.” Charlie puffs up at that, looking proud, and Tim’s smile comes a little easier. Charlie leans in, though, a look in his eye that makes Tim hesitate.</p><p> </p><p>“Not that Conner knows—doesn’t let anybody but his Ma cut his hair,” Charlie tells Tim, conspiratorial. Tim relaxes and covers his laugh with a hand, nudging Conner, who’s rubbing the back of his neck. He barrels on, choosing to ignore the interjection.</p><p> </p><p>“Charlie, this is Tim. My, uh. My boyfriend.” It makes Tim feel a little better that he’s not the only one who’s embarrassed about Conner saying that out loud—Conner’s not blushing quite as badly as Tim, but he can see the pink creeping up Conner’s neck to the tips of his ears. Charlie just grins at them and sticks a hand out to Tim, though.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Tim. I hear you’re from out of town. You go easy on our Conner, alright? He’s a big fella, but he’s a real gentle type.” Tim returns the handshake and fights down a laugh. Maybe he didn’t need to worry <em>quite</em> so much about people’s reactions—Charlie sounds more concerned about Tim being a city boy than the fact that Conner is dating a guy.</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll be nice, sir, don’t worry. With Conner, it’s hard not to be, right?” He shoots Conner a sideways little smile, and now Conner is <em>really </em>blushing. Charlie just laughs and nods, though, satisfied with Tim’s answer.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s right, he’s a good kid. Well, don’t let me keep you two. It was nice to meet you, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>Bidding Charlie farewell, they start walking again; Conner’s face is still red, and Tim keeps glancing behind them, fighting to contain his laughter until Charlie is out of earshot in the other direction. He’s pretty sure he succeeds, but when it bursts out of him, he laughs so hard and so long that he can barely keep himself upright, reaching out to clutch Conner’s arm for support as he stumbles along.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright,” Conner mutters after a minute of that; he doesn’t shake Tim off, but he does slow to a halt, waiting for Tim to recover himself.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” Tim gasps when he starts to catch his breath, trying to fight the mirth still bubbling in his chest. “That was just—that was so cute? A—a real gentle type, oh my god, he’s worried your city slicker boyfriend is going to break your poor, innocent little heart.”</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Alright</em>,” Conner repeats, sounding exasperated. Wiping tears from the corners of his eyes, Tim squints up at Conner. He looks embarrassed, but when he glances down at Tim, who’s still struggling to contain the breathy little chuckle that wants to push its way out of his throat, the tension goes out of his shoulders and a smile starts to tug at the corner of his lips.</p><p> </p><p>“Come on,” Tim says, finally starting to regain his composure and using Conner’s arm to pull himself back upright. “You have to admit that’s pretty funny. He’s worried that <em>I’m</em> going to corrupt <em>you</em>? Oh, man. If only he had seen us as kids—he’d know better.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thank god he didn’t. No one needed to see that,” Conner says, shaking his head. “Now come on, are you gonna expire out here on the sidewalk, or can we go get our ice cream?”</p><p> </p><p>“No, I’m good, let’s go,” Tim says, taking one last breath that still shudders with laughter. Conner immediately exacts revenge on him by reaching down and snagging his hand, lacing their fingers together as he tugs Tim forward. Tim almost trips again, biting his tongue to contain the humiliating squeak his body tries to produce. Conner smirks down at him—why is the bastard so <em>tall</em>?—but says nothing, and the silence doesn’t make Tim feel any better. He can’t tell if Conner <em>knows</em> or if they’re just playing some weird, one-sided game of gay chicken. Which option is worse, Tim couldn’t say, and he braces himself all over again for whatever this date is going to throw at him.</p><p> </p><p>A bell dings overhead as they enter the ice cream shop, and Tim glances around. This place only looks slightly more modern than the diner they had visited last time; the owners decided to forgo the full cheesiness of the retro ice cream parlor schtick, but landed somewhere in the eighties instead, judging by the checkerboard floor and all of the magenta and lime neon signs on the walls. One eyebrow raised, Tim glances at Conner, who just shrugs and waves him towards the counter.</p><p> </p><p>The person behind the counter is a gangly teenage boy with dark, lanky hair—not the friend Conner wants him to meet, Tim assumes. Conner greets him, but they don’t seem to really know each other, and they get their ice cream and find a booth without incident. It’s a nice change of pace; Tim can appreciate the friendliness of a place like Smallville, but he’s still a Gothamite at heart, and not being able to go <em>anywhere</em> without having a full conversation with someone is going to start getting old soon.</p><p> </p><p>As they sit and dig into their ice cream, Tim notices that Conner is starting to look a little stressed, stabbing absently at the contents of his paper dish and staring out the window somewhere over Tim’s shoulder. It probably bothers him more than it should to see a crease starting to form between Conner’s eyebrows, but they <em>are</em> supposed to be on a date, after all, so he nudges Conner’s ankle gently under the table to get his attention.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, are you okay? You look worried.” Conner blinks at him, then shakes his head and smiles. The curve of his lips is lopsided and a little too thin for Tim’s liking, and Tim gives him a disbelieving frown in return. Deflating a little, Conner raises one shoulder, glancing away again.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m okay. Just, you know. I feel a little bad about you having to do this kind of thing with me.” His voice is low, pitched just loud enough for Tim and Tim alone. Tim sort of wishes he hadn’t heard it at all. As a friend, he hates to see Conner uncomfortable, and as someone fighting a stubborn, all-consuming sort of crush, it definitely takes the wind out of his sails to hear that having to do date-like things with Tim is making Conner feel bad, whatever the reason.</p><p> </p><p>“Why would you feel bad about that? It’s not like we haven’t done things like this before. We’re basically just hanging out, even if your friends think otherwise.” Conner shrugs and starts tearing little bits of paper off the corner of his napkin, not looking at Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, and obviously I don’t mind doing stuff with you. You’re my best friend, and it’s still amazing that we’re getting to spend so much time together. But, you know, calling it a date… you should get to do this kind of thing with someone you actually <em>like</em>. You haven’t… really dated anybody in a while, right? It kind of sucks that you’re having to fake this with me.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim stares at Conner for a long minute, not sure if he wants to laugh or cry. Conner keeps his head down, eyes on the table and still picking at the napkin, and if nothing else, Tim has to get him to cut <em>that</em> out. Needs him to stop looking so awfully guilty when all of this is really Tim’s fault, anyway, so Tim follows an impulse and sticks his hand out across the table towards Conner. It gets Conner to look up, at least, and when he glances skeptically between Tim and the offered hand, Tim gives him the most reassuring smile he can manage.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s okay,” Tim tells him, and hopes Conner is too busy in his own head to hear the way his heart stutters when Conner puts his hand in Tim’s after a second.</p><p> </p><p>Technically, even discounting the incident on the way in, it’s not like he’s never held Conner’s hand before. Usually the context has been very different, though—Conner snatching him up out of danger or throwing him into a new assault in the heat of battle, his touch safely muted by Tim’s glove between their skin. Now he can feel the heat and the slight catch of Conner’s skin, callused from the farm chores he likes to do without the help of his TTK, against Tim’s own rough palm. There’s a shocking realness to the weight of Conner’s hand in his, and it’s a struggle to keep his composure together long enough to look confident about this for Conner when there’s a goofy smile trying to curl his lips too far. “It doesn’t bother me. I promise I’m not secretly devastated by the bleakness of my love life—you don’t need to worry about my feelings.”</p><p> </p><p>“You sure?” Conner asks, and his smile is still small and wan, but real enough this time for Tim. Squeezing his hand—and god, that shouldn’t feel so <em>nice</em>—Tim tries for a playful smile, keeping his tone light and easy.</p><p> </p><p>“Positive. I mean, look at my family, right? Not a lot of super successful relationships going on there, shocking though it is that B’s training to stay up all night punching criminals really good doesn’t translate into being wildly romantically competent. I really don’t need any extra drama in my life right now. I’m fine by myself.”</p><p> </p><p>The guilt is starting to fade out of Conner’s expression, although he still doesn’t look entirely happy with that answer. “You shouldn’t—”</p><p> </p><p>“So, this is the boyfriend?” Tim jumps, pulling his hand reflexively out of Conner’s, and looks up at the newcomer. She’s a slender blonde of average height, wearing jeans and a sleeveless grey crop top that looks like she made it out of an old t-shirt under her mandatory apron, a thick stack of napkins in one hand and a collection of plastic-wrapped spoons clutched in the fist propped up on her hip. Tim glances at Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“Hi, Lori,” Conner says. The name sounds vaguely familiar, but Tim is distracted by the way Conner is glancing uncertainly between the two of them like he’s not sure how this is going to go. After the Simon incident, Tim supposes he has reason to be wary. She busies herself refilling the napkin holder and replenishing the supply of spoons in a basket on the table, arranging them neatly and taking the time to size Tim up. He smiles at her briefly before looking back to Conner, who still seems uncomfortable.</p><p> </p><p>“I have to say, this makes me feel better about you not being interested in me,” she continues, still eyeing Tim without acknowledging Conner at all. That gets a disgusted look out of Conner, and Tim can’t help raising a curious eyebrow at him.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>This</em> is what makes you feel better? Not the fact that we’re <em>cousins</em>?” The last word comes out low, nearly a whisper, and Conner glances around like he wants to make sure nobody heard him. Luckily for him, there’s no one in either of the adjoining booths, and the air conditioning and music are loud enough to drown him out to anyone except their little trio. Except—wait. <em>What</em>?</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I mean, it would have been gross in retrospect, but you still didn’t like me before we knew we were related. Now I can see that I’m just not your type at <em>all</em>.” Oh, if she only knew how wrong she was. Unfortunately, Tim doesn’t have time to be amused by that, because he’s busy kicking Conner under the table. Conner glances back at him, annoyed, before his eyes go wide.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, shit,” he says, and Lori frowns at him, confused.</p><p> </p><p>“What?”</p><p> </p><p>“I—nothing. I just, uh. Forgot to mention to Tim that we’re cousins.” Tim takes back the warm, fuzzy feelings he’s been having about Conner all night—he’s going to <em>kill</em> him. Of course the name Lori sounded familiar. This is <em>Lori Luthor</em>, and how could Conner have forgotten to warn him that <em>this</em> was the “friend” they were meeting? Although at least this is someone that Conner has actually mentioned to him in the past, unlike the nasty little surprise that was Simon.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, jeez,” Lori mutters, putting her hands on her hips and fixing him with a disappointed glare. “You are terrible at this stuff, you know that?” Sighing and shaking her head, she turns to Tim, extending a hand towards him.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, let’s start at the beginning. Hi, I’m Lori. Conner’s my cousin.” Tim collects himself enough to smile and shake her hand, although he’s watching her much more carefully now.</p><p> </p><p>“Nice to meet you, Lori. I’m Tim. Conner’s my boyfriend.” It really shouldn’t make his stomach curl and the aching sensation of longing press up behind his gritted teeth to say that. Lori provides a convenient distraction by looking around conspiratorially before leaning in, cupping one hand at her mouth to stage-whisper in Tim’s direction.</p><p> </p><p>“Simon told me you’re Tim Drake-Wayne? Is that true?” She sounds excited, and Tim wishes it were acceptable behavior to dive through the window beside them and make a break for it. He officially hates this small-town shit <em>so much</em>. Across the table, Conner leans his elbows on the table and drops his face into his hands, despairing.</p><p> </p><p>“Um. Yeah, I guess so. It’s kind of supposed to be a secret, though, okay? My dad doesn’t know I’m here.” The way Lori responds to that statement throws Tim a little—instead of looking confused or even more excited to be in on a celebrity secret, she eases back and nods, full of understanding, like this is familiar territory.</p><p> </p><p>“I got you, no worries. No promises it won’t get out if you keep showing your face in town, but nobody’ll hear it from me.” Tim is surprised by how seriously she seems to take it considering the attitude she’s been giving Conner so far, but he smiles sincerely at her.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Lori. I appreciate that.”</p><p> </p><p>“No problem. I mean, I’m just glad I get a chance to say thank you for helping my mom.” Across the table, Conner picks his head up from where he’s been watching apprehensively between his hands; he looks pleased and a little proud. Tim’s not entirely sure what she’s talking about, so he maintains a pleasant, neutral sort of smile, nodding to encourage her. “I heard Superboy asked the big guy to call in a favor from Wayne Enterprises last year, and the doctors your family sent have been a huge help. It’s great just having the nursing support, but she’s been having a lot more good days lately, too. I can’t tell you how much it means—the least I can do is not rat you out. You can count on me.”</p><p> </p><p>It catches Tim off-guard—he had somehow forgotten the origin of the whole Lex Luthor debacle last year, that it was Lena’s illness that Conner had initially called him about. The situation had sounded bad enough that he’d rounded Bart and Cassie up to go check on Conner, but what Conner had really asked him for help with was finding medical support for Lena. He feels a little bad that he hadn’t remembered a thing about it until Lori mentioned it directly—he’s pretty sure he’s still getting quarterly reports from the doctor managing Lena’s condition, but it’s been a while since he’s read one.</p><p> </p><p>Burying that guilt, he reaches out to touch Lori’s forearm briefly. “Of course, Lori. I’m really glad to hear she’s doing well—if there’s ever anything else you need, please just reach out. I’m happy to do whatever I can.” Lori catches his hand and squeezes it quickly, looking grateful in a way that Tim knows he doesn’t deserve.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Tim. You’re great—I can’t believe this dork landed you,” she adds, eyeing Conner with a mixture of confusion and friendly disdain. Conner sticks his tongue out at her, and she gives an exaggerated roll of her eyes before straightening up suddenly, like she just remembered something.</p><p> </p><p>“By the way, Conner, did you hear there was another break-in?” Conner’s expression morphs from one of fond patience to outrage in seconds—disturbed as Tim is about the news Lori just delivered, it’s still kind of funny to watch.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Another</em>? It hasn’t even been a week, what is going on?” Lori shrugs, folding her arms over her chest.</p><p> </p><p>“Dunno. There’s all kinds of rumors going around, but I hear it was a jewelry store this time. It was just last night, so no word yet on if they actually took anything this time.”</p><p> </p><p>“And <em>you</em> don’t happen to know anything about these little incidents, right?” Tim looks between the two of them, observing the way Lori’s shoulders tense up, although Tim’s not sure what the accusation is about.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>No</em>. You know that was different, asshole. And isn’t there a friend of ours who’s supposed to keep an eye out for this sort of thing? Where’s he been, huh?” There’s a definite barb in that comment, and she turns and stalks away as Conner opens his mouth to respond, looking upset. Tim gives him a minute to work through whatever he’s thinking, and then taps his fingers lightly on the table.</p><p> </p><p>“So….”</p><p> </p><p>“The second time I met Lori, she was trashing a doctor’s office because the guy refused to help her mom after their insurance stopped covering her treatments.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh. And you thought she would mention the break-ins if she had something to do with them because she was… what, bragging?” Conner makes a face at him, but his shoulders relax a little, and Tim smiles.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, it was a dumb question. I’ll apologize later.”</p><p> </p><p>“Good plan. And did I read that wrong, or does she also know about you?” It’s not a thrilling thought, but Lori seems more level-headed than Simon, at least. Conner frowns again as he jams his spoon into his ice cream—rocky road with chocolate chips and strawberries—and glances out the window, avoiding Tim’s eyes.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah. When Sujan—you haven’t met him yet, but he’s another friend—when Sujan uh… came into our lives, she figured it out. It’s kind of complicated, I’ll explain later.” Tim just stares at him for a second, wondering how this could be <em>more</em> complicated, then props his cheek up on a hand and heaves a sigh, shoveling a spoonful of his own mint chocolate chip into his mouth.</p><p> </p><p>“You really haven’t caught a break since you’ve been back, have you?” With that acknowledgement, Conner seems to sort of collapse in on himself, crossing his arms on the table and dropping his forehead to meet them. Tim fights the urge to reach across the table and card his fingers through Conner’s thick hair, do <em>something</em> to comfort him.</p><p> </p><p>“Man, you have no idea. I mean, this spring was pretty quiet, but before that… it was just one thing after another for months. I honestly thought I was going to have to leave Smallville just to keep everyone safe.” Tim caves just a little and reaches out to rest his fingertips against Conner’s forearm—they’re supposed to be on a date after all, right? And hearing that from Conner just hurts too much. The thought of Conner feeling like he needed to sacrifice his own safe haven to protect other people makes his heart ache with sympathy. He’s never been in <em>quite</em> that situation, but he knows how lonely and low it is to feel like your home has been taken from you.</p><p> </p><p>“People are safer with you here, Conner. Bad things happen all over the place—most people just don’t have someone like you around looking out for them.” Conner gives him a tired smile, getting back to his rapidly-melting ice cream, but doesn’t look like he entirely believes Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, maybe. Did I ever tell you about the whole Broken Silo Incident?”</p><p> </p><p>“Um… no?” That name sounds ominous, and Tim frowns. It feels like every day he’s here, he finds out one or two or three awful things that have happened, none of which Conner ever told him about.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, man, it was <em>bad</em>. Turned out this creepy time wizard named Tannarak had somehow managed to grow hundreds of clones of me in a secret underground town beneath Smallville that he had populated with these magic zombie golems, and he was trying to steal the souls of all of the people in Smallville to power his half-Kryptonian super-army and take over the world.”</p><p> </p><p>“Wow.”<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>“Yeah. The worst part? The clones were all naked. All my friends, plus <em>the Phantom Stranger,</em> have now seen my dick hundreds of times. Nobody has ever mentioned it, but you can’t un-know something like that.”</p><p> </p><p>“That… that is truly the nightmare scenario. Jesus.”</p><p> </p><p>“No kidding. So, I don’t know, I kind of feel like that one was on me? And then there was this invasion of asshole aliens with these nightmare-inducing plants that crashed in Smallville and infected most of the population… Sujan and Lori were able to help everyone recover, but it was <em>rough</em>. And I knew about it because I intercepted the first ship, but they still managed to sneak two more through. I still hate thinking about the stuff it showed me.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner looks seriously distressed, and Tim fully gives up and reaches for Conner’s hand again; Conner glances down, surprised, and a wave of panic overcomes Tim at the thought of Conner rejecting the gesture. Blowing his cover and revealing his absurd crush <em>should</em> be the worst thing that could happen, but somehow, the idea of Conner rejecting him is infinitely worse. Tim’s not exactly sure how he’s managing that when he <em>knows</em> that all Conner feels for him is friendship, that the rejection is absolute, factual, and current, but apparently he’s capable of even more complicated emotional gymnastics than he realized.</p><p> </p><p>Conner just smiles at him, though, still looking sort of upset about whatever unpleasant thoughts he’d been having, and twines their fingers together. Tim’s heart does another stupid flopping thing. Dammit.</p><p> </p><p>“What did it show you?” he asks, hoping Conner won’t notice the minor arrhythmia he’s responsible for. Sighing heavily, Conner rubs his thumb idly along the outside of Tim’s as he stares at the table, the pad of his thumb brushing from knuckle to wrist as he collects his thoughts. It’s <em>very</em> distracting, but Tim tries to hold it together since this seems like a difficult subject for Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“It was… the future. <em>A</em> future. Smallville was on fire, and you and a bunch of people I didn’t recognize—you called them ‘the New Titans’—were after me. You said I had killed Bruce, and probably Cassie, and a lot of other people, and you… you were going to kill me. You were all freaked out on some drug cocktail Bruce had given you to make you strong enough to hurt me, and then Simon came along and killed <em>you</em>, right in front of me, and I just…. It was <em>awful</em>, man. I know those plant things were designed to show people their worst nightmares, but it… it really worked. I still have bad dreams about it.”</p><p> </p><p>“That was <em>not</em> you, and it never will be,” Tim tells him, quiet and fierce. His grip on Conner’s hand is so tight that his knuckles go pale, but Conner doesn’t seem bothered by it. He doesn’t look at Tim, though.</p><p> </p><p>“Are you sure? I mean, you can’t say nothing like that has ever happened before, and the Luthor genes….”</p><p> </p><p>The last part comes out so soft Tim barely catches it, but he leans forward across the table, shaking their entwined hands.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey. Look at me. <em>Conner.</em>” When Conner glances up at him, Tim feels the pain on Conner’s face mirrored in his own heart. This goes well beyond the stupid crush—his best friend is hurting, badly, and Tim desperately needs to do something about it. “You are a <em>good person</em>, Conner, you hear me? What happened at the tower was never your fault. It could have happened to literally any of us—you just got unlucky. If you wanted to be a terrible person, you’ve had ample opportunity, don’t you think? Fashion choices and pick-up lines in your youth notwithstanding, you’ve never done anything unforgiveable. You work <em>so </em>hard to be good, you <em>died</em> for it, and the fact that turning out that way is your biggest fear—don’t you think that counts for something? You’re good and kind and you help people every chance you get. By <em>choice</em>, not because of your genes or anything else. Give yourself a break, okay?”</p><p> </p><p>If that last bit comes out a little pleading, Tim thinks he’s allowed—Conner has been wrestling with this same problem for years, and Tim wants so much for him to forgive himself for the circumstances of his creation. It hurts to see Conner punishing himself over and over for something out of his control and a possibility that will never come to be. Conner looks at him for a long, quiet moment, and Tim wonders if this time it will finally sink in.</p><p> </p><p>“If… if it ever does happen—”</p><p> </p><p>“It <em>won’t</em>.”</p><p> </p><p>“Promise me you’ll take me out? Don’t let me hurt anyone.” He sounds small and afraid, and Tim wants to lean across the table and shake him or kiss him or <em>something</em>.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner, I won’t ‘take you out’ because I will not ever let that happen, and neither will you. I can’t even tell you how ridiculous it is for someone as fundamentally good as you to be so worried about this. <em>Please</em> stop beating yourself up over something that won’t ever be a problem.” Conner doesn’t look entirely satisfied, but he nods reluctantly.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I guess you’re probably right. I just… y’know.” Tim squeezes his hand, relaxes enough to smile sympathetically at Conner. He hadn’t meant to get so worked up, but hearing Conner talk about himself that way makes Tim want to scream.</p><p> </p><p>“I know. But you’re okay, Conner. I promise.” Conner smiles wearily back at him, and they finish their mostly-melted ice cream in silence. Tim spends most of that time boring a hole in the table with his eyes, racking his brain for something he can say or do to help Conner set this problem to rest permanently.</p><p> </p><p>He doesn’t come up with anything, and as they finish up, Conner grabs their paper bowls in one hand, tossing them easily into a trash can as he passes. They pause at the counter on their way out, where a bored-looking Lori has replaced the teen from earlier; Conner shoves a few extra dollars in the tip jar before leaning in close to apologize to her. Tim isn’t paying much attention, still busy worrying about Conner, but tunes in enough to hear him ask her to meet him at the barn later that night; she rolls her eyes but nods, and Conner reaches out to squeeze her shoulder gently.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Lori,” he says, and she makes a shooing motion at them.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, yeah. Get out of here, lovebirds.” She smirks meaningfully at them, glancing down. Tim follows her gaze, and his heart leaps into his throat as he realizes that, somehow, Conner had never let go of his hand.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>A) I want Lori to dress more like a punk so I dressed her more like a punk (what was up with the frilly floral shirts and leggings they kept giving her in the comics??) </p><p>B) Yes I absolutely did forget Sujan's existence completely in my rush to force Tim into Conner's personal space earlier in the fic, so in this AU Sujan is living with the Valentines instead lol</p><p>C) Not sure if you noticed but I sure do like hand-holding!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim and Conner hang out with friends.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Okay yall I ran out of time to finish editing this before I have to go to bed but also I'm pretty excited about it?? This is still relying pretty heavily on the events of Conner's very brief Superboy run in 2010, I guess I've kind of decided to take on wrapping up some of the loose ends there?? Not where I pictured this fic going lol. Anyway, enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They hold hands all the way back to Conner’s truck. Tim has no idea what’s happening.</p><p> </p><p>It’s fine, he tells himself. After all, it’s not that weird for friends to hold hands, especially if they’re supposed to be pretending to date each other. Tim holds hands with his other friends sometimes, too. He’s held hands with Steph and Cass and even Bart, on the rare occasion that Bart can bear to stand still long enough to have his hand held. It’s not that weird.</p><p> </p><p>It’s just that he can’t ever remember Conner being this… <em>tactile</em> before Tim came to visit. Even once Conner deposits him in the truck (he opens the door and helps Tim in, and when Tim shoots him a disbelieving look, he shrugs and claims that if anyone saw him being rude to his date, Ma would hear about it. Tim doesn’t point out that the parking lot is completely empty.) Tim still sits there, staring at the dashboard and trying to come up with reasons why Conner holding his hand isn’t confusing and <em>definitely</em> isn’t anything to get worked up about.</p><p> </p><p>He would have been content to do that the entire way back to the farm, and probably for several days after they arrived, but Conner clears his throat about halfway through the drive. “Hey, so, I asked Lori to come over tonight because I want to see if she knows anything about what’s going on with Simon. Not that she’s like, in on it,” he adds quickly, glancing at Tim, “but just in case he told her anything about it that we might want to know. And to give her the heads up if he <em>didn’t</em> tell her. They’re not exactly best friends, but she’s gonna be <em>pissed</em> if he didn’t tell her that he’s interning for her asshole uncle.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right. I guess she’s not exactly a fan of Lex after how he treated her mother.”</p><p> </p><p>“Major understatement. So, I was thinking—I know you Bat-types are nosy. You wanna hide in the barn and eavesdrop?” If Tim hadn’t already been fighting a major crush on Conner, that might have done it. Say what you will, Tim’s best friend <em>gets</em> him.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re a man after my own heart, sir,” he says, teasing and happy. Conner grins, glancing over at him, and Tim’s breath stutters a little. He forges ahead, shoving the stupid nerves down. “I guess I won’t surprise you if I take you up on that offer. You don’t mind, though?”</p><p> </p><p>He catches the corner of a crooked smile on Conner’s profile, soft in the rapidly-fading evening light. “Nah. It would kind of make me feel better, honestly. Maybe it’s nothing, but if it turns out to be a problem… I’m getting kind of tired of dealing with this stuff on my own, you know? My friends here are great, but as the only experienced superhero, I end up the leader by default, and I usually feel pretty underqualified. I don’t know how you always managed it, man. I think I’m happier just being the beef on the team.”</p><p> </p><p>“Nothing wrong with that. I mean, you are pretty damned good at it. And you know I’m always here to back you up,” Tim tells him, smiling as he settles into the corner between his seat and the door of the truck, where he can angle himself to watch Conner in his peripheral vision without openly staring at him. “If you want me there, I’ll be there.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I’d appreciate it. Thanks, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“Anytime,” Tim murmurs, and wonders if Conner knows just how much he means it.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Hidden in shadow, Tim is hanging upside-down by his knees from a rafter of the barn, feeling a strong connection with the bats back at the manor; he’s not sure if Bruce would be proud or worried. Twenty feet below, Conner and Lori stand near the double doors of the barn, talking just loudly enough for Tim to follow the conversation.</p><p> </p><p>“That little <em>cretin</em>,” Lori snarls, beginning to pace back and forth, hands balled into fists at her sides. Tim can see the tight, angry angle of her shoulders even from here, through the dark and the denim jacket she’s wearing.</p><p> </p><p>“Did you ever actually tell him what Lex did?”</p><p> </p><p>“I told him enough,” Lori says shortly, whirling on her heel to start marching back in the other direction. “He knows I hate the bastard—I told him that much when he started snooping around asking me questions about him. I guess this was why.” She pauses just long enough let out a short, frustrated scream that sounds like it comes from clenched teeth and punches Conner without warning, slamming a fist into his gut just below the ribs hard enough that Tim can hear the impact all the way up in the rafters. She shakes her hand out and resumes her pacing. Conner sighs.</p><p> </p><p>“You know, it’s still not nice to hit me even if it doesn’t hurt me.”</p><p> </p><p>“Sometimes I need to hit something. Or someone.”</p><p> </p><p>“Anger management, Lori.”</p><p> </p><p>“Not everyone’s perfect, <em>Conner</em>.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I know how that feels.” Lori snorts, shakes her head, and keeps walking.</p><p> </p><p>“Do you think it’s safe?” she asks after Conner lets her work through her thoughts in silence for a while. Tim can’t see her face from all the way up here, but he can hear the worry under her anger now. The rafter is starting to bite into the back of his knees, and Tim pulls himself upright slowly, gauging to see if he loses the conversation. Even sitting upright, he can hear the gusty sigh Conner lets out.</p><p> </p><p>“I dunno, Lori. I don’t think he would do anything bad on purpose, but he gets so focused…. We know people have already gotten hurt thanks to his experiments, even if they were only minor injuries. I can’t act like I’m not worried about how your uncle could steer him, given the chance.” At the ice cream shop, Conner had mentioned that in his nightmare, Simon had killed Tim despite Tim having some sort of drug in his system that would have made him strong enough to hurt Conner—he can’t blame him for being worried about the possibilities, given that mental image.</p><p> </p><p>“The kid has no common sense,” Lori says, exasperated. “He would never see it coming if that piece of shit was trying to pull something sneaky. But… I mean, he is really smart. He basically built himself a portable death ray, you know that? He wears the thing on his head when he’s doing stuff with you—I used it to zap that Parasite guy when we were underground in that creepy fake town. What if he’s just <em>acting</em> like he’s clueless? What if he figured out your connection to Lex and went to LexCorp on purpose?”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, wait, what makes you think he would do <em>that</em>? Isn’t it kind of a leap, thinking if he figured out I’ve got Lex’s DNA it would turn him to the dark side or something?”</p><p> </p><p>“You ever notice how <em>resentful</em> he is?” Lori asks. She sounds dubious and a little scared—Tim can’t blame her, based on how this conversation is going. Nothing he’s heard tonight has made him feel any better about Simon being anywhere near Conner. “It doesn’t take much to piss him off—and yes, I can see that condescending look on your face, Kent, I know I’m not any better—but the kid holds a grudge like nobody’s business. I don’t think it would bother him that you’ve got Luthor DNA, but if he finds out you’ve been <em>hiding</em> it? Not to mention that it kind of means we’ve been lying about the fact that we’re family, no matter how weird and questionable cloning as a form of relation is.”</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe….” Conner says, sounding doubtful now, too. “I dunno, Lori. Have you picked up any weird vibes from him?”</p><p> </p><p>“No, but you know I’m not great at that stuff yet. I’ve gotten better, but I still have to focus pretty hard to get a glimpse of something, and I almost never want to know what’s going on in Simon’s creepy little head, anyway. Maybe you should ask Sujan? He was living with the guy, after all, and he’s a lot more sensitive than I am.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, maybe you’re right. I don’t wanna snoop, but….”</p><p> </p><p>“You have to protect yourself, Conner. Even superheroes can get hurt. <em>You</em> know that.” Tim likes Lori, he decides. Temper aside, she’s realistic, observant, and not overly trusting, all qualities that Tim appreciates in a person. It does get him thinking, though, that if Simon is as quick to anger as Lori is claiming, the fewer lies they give themselves the chance to be caught in, the better. Simon finding out about Tim's identity would be the worst-case scenario, but they've told quite a few other lies already, and Conner, not used to keeping secrets and not particularly good at it, is bound to let something slip eventually. Tim makes a snap decision and falls off the rafter with a yelp.</p><p> </p><p>“What the—?”</p><p> </p><p>“Holy—!”</p><p> </p><p>Conner is catching him almost before he can register the actual distance to the floor, snatching Tim up into his default bridal carry in mid-air. Tim tells himself firmly that the swooping thrill in his stomach is from the sudden fall, <em>not</em> Conner's arms around him or his hand braced against Conner's chest.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim!” The shock in Conner's voice is genuine, which serves Tim's purposes just fine. He winks at Conner, and then buries the instantaneous humiliation that washes over him and that damned swoopy feeling under the character of Timothy Drake-Wayne, Definitely Not A Secret Vigilante.</p><p> </p><p>“C-Conner? What's going on?” It's not hard for him to sound scared and confused—he’s spent plenty of time playing the innocent kid over the years, and maybe in the situation he’s gotten himself into, it’s not too far off the mark, anyway. Conner's face twitches into something almost pained for a split second before he's glaring at Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Um, hey, Lori? Could you give us a few minutes?”</p><p> </p><p>“Shit,” Tim hears her mutter, before calling more loudly, “Yeah, I think I'm just gonna head home, actually. I'll text you.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks. Be careful getting home,” Conner tells her, still not taking his eyes off of Tim. He looks pretty annoyed. As Lori makes her way quickly out of the barn, he demands, “What were you <em>thinking</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” Tim murmurs, keeping his voice low. He likes Lori, but this whole thing will have been worse than pointless if she hangs around to hear their “lover’s quarrel” and finds out Tim knows more than he’s been letting on. “I thought it would make this mess more manageable if your friends know that I’m in on the whole superhero thing. I figured this was easier than having to manufacture something later.”</p><p> </p><p>“You don’t have to whisper, she’s headed up the driveway,” Conner tells Tim, sighing. “You couldn’t have at least warned me? You could have broken your fucking neck, Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“You wouldn’t have let me die in a barn,” Tim says and pats Conner’s shoulder, totally self-assured. “The idea only occurred to me when Lori started mentioning how bad of a temper Simon has. If I had thought of it earlier I would have said something to you, but I was already up in the rafters. Besides, you being genuinely surprised wasn’t a bad thing, I think. Verisimilitude.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner just looks at him for a second, disbelieving. “So, you were counting on my super-speed to prevent you from <em>falling to your death</em>, but you forgot you could also utilize my super<em>-hearing</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Now it’s Tim’s turn to stare. “…Well, when you put it <em>that</em> way, sure, it sounds bad,” he concedes after a beat, a blush starting to prickle hotly in his cheeks. “I’m not saying it was my best thought-out plan ever, okay? It was kind of a split-second decision.”</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe I should ship you back to Gotham for a few days,” Conner mutters, starting to float back towards the house now that they’ve resolved the matter of Tim’s momentary idiocy. “Get you all wound up and paranoid again. I’m starting to think all this fresh air is relaxing you a little <em>too</em> much, which I wouldn’t even have assumed was possible.”</p><p> </p><p>“You could take it as a compliment?” Tim suggests, tipping his head back to observe the moon as he waits for the evidence of his embarrassment to dissipate. “I can worry about all of the manipulative little details of our ill-conceived cover story when you’re around because I trust you to take care of the big stuff, like not letting me accidentally kill myself?”</p><p> </p><p>The look Conner gives him is withering, and Tim shrugs, glancing away again. “Just a thought.”</p><p> </p><p>They make the rest of the short trip back to the house in silence. As Conner helps Tim back in through his bedroom window, he speaks up again. “So, you’re not gonna try to sneak back out again, right?” Tim takes a second to get his feet back under him, then turns to look at Conner, confused.</p><p> </p><p>“Why would I do that?” Conner shrugs as he follows Tim in, the window seeming to slide shut behind him on its own as his feet touch the floor.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, Lori mentioned another break-in earlier, and last time….” He trails off, and Tim sighs.</p><p> </p><p>“I promised you I’d wait for a weekend, didn’t I?” That gets a wry grin out of Conner, who reaches out to ruffle Tim’s hair. Tim slaps his hand away, indignant as he tries to fix the damage. They’re going to sleep anyway, he supposes, and settles for crossing his arms over his chest and glaring. Conner’s grin just gets wider as he ambles over to his dresser.  </p><p> </p><p>“Cool. In exchange for your good behavior, you wanna come with me to talk to Sujan tomorrow?”</p><p> </p><p>“That makes it sound like I’m a criminal being offered early parole,” Tim complains, frowning as he sits heavily on the edge of the air mattress and starts unlacing his sneakers. He doesn’t look up as Conner strips his S-shield t-shirt off and replaces it with the plain one he wears to bed.</p><p> </p><p>“I mean….”</p><p> </p><p>“Has anyone ever told you how rude you are? You’re <em>so</em> rude,” Tim says, glancing up as he jams his head through the neck of his sleep shirt to shoot Conner a disapproving look. Conner just snorts and pulls a pair of sweatpants out of the top drawer of the dresser, unbuttoning his jeans. Tim immediately starts trying to forget that he knows what that motion looks like now.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry, the scientists must have missed manners when they were artificially implanting me with knowledge. So, are you coming or what?”</p><p> </p><p>“If you don’t mind, yeah. The farm’s great, but I’d like to see more of the area, too. What’s the deal with Sujan, anyway? You were pretty vague about him earlier.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, right,” Conner manages around a yawn as he crawls into bed. “Yeah, he’s a psychic from the twenty-third century who came back in time because he wanted my help training to defeat some evil guy who had turned Smallville into a walled fortress-slash-forced labor camp or… something. He’s cool.”</p><p> </p><p>“You know,” Tim says as he finishes changing and rolls the rest of the way onto the air mattress, “I’m mostly used to your time-traveling, interdimensional adventures it at this point, but sometimes you say the weirdest shit <em>so</em> casually that it still catches me off guard.” Conner laughs, the sound mostly muffled by his pillow. Tim thinks he might make some snarky comeback, but a few seconds later, he catches a snore instead. He rolls his eyes, settling down under the sheets. He has plenty of time to digest all of that information before he drifts off.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim is ready to go the next day when Conner gets back from school, and feeling pretty nervous about the meeting they’re about to have. During the night and throughout the day, he’s had little to do except think about all of the many ways that him meeting with a <em>psychic</em> could go very, horribly wrong. Weeding the garden for Ma had been a nice way to get some fresh air, but it wasn’t exactly the sort of mentally taxing task that would actually keep him from ruminating—these days, Tim is, if nothing else, a world-class ruminator.  </p><p> </p><p>Conner has assured him that they’ll sit down and deal with his homework later, so Tim follows him down the porch steps reluctantly, climbing into the truck with a feeling like his stomach is full of angry snakes. He manages about two whole minutes of silence before he clears his throat.</p><p> </p><p>“So… you said Sujan is a psychic, right? How does that work for him?” He’s fiddling with a loose string on his jeans, doesn’t look up to see if Conner has any reaction to that question. He gets a thoughtful hum, glances up just enough to catch Conner’s fingers tapping the top of the steering wheel as he thinks.</p><p> </p><p>“He’s pretty powerful, but I think a lot of it is distance-based. From what he’s told me, he has some general… empathic abilities, I guess? Like, he usually has a vibe of how people are feeling, and he gets a pretty good range on that. The nearer he gets to someone, the more he can pick up from them, and if he’s almost within touching distance, he can do a lot more. He was able to search the memories of a guy in a coma, and he showed me and Simon his memories of the future, that kind of thing. With the Phantom Stranger helping him out, he was able to communicate with the souls of everyone in Smallville and help guide them back to their bodies during the whole Broken Silo thing.”</p><p> </p><p>“Wow. That’s pretty impressive. Does he… read minds?”</p><p><br/><br/>“You know, I’m not totally sure? I’ve never really asked. He’s been training Lori since we found out she’s got some sort of latent psychic power, too, so he’s told me a little about it when I’ve been around for their practice sessions, but I never asked if he’s the type of psychic who can pluck a thought out of your head while you’re having it. Why?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shrugs, regretting deeply how thoughtlessly trusting Conner is and tugging more aggressively at the string he’s still playing with. “I’ve just been thinking since last night, you know…. It kind of worries me to go talk to someone with those kinds of powers when there are so many secrets we’re keeping right now. Our relationship, my identity, that kind of thing.” From the corner of his eye, he can see Conner sit up straight, taking his eyes off the road long enough to fully turn his head, presumably staring at Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh. Right, well. I hate to say this, but one of those things is probably a non-issue.” That gives Tim pause. He has no idea if Conner is talking about their actual relationship status or Tim’s identity, and the tension of that is enough to finally get him to look up.</p><p> </p><p>“…Conner?” He’s staring rigidly out the windshield, his fingers drumming a much more aggressive beat on the wheel. Even in this moment, Tim has to fight the urge to reach out and still his fingers—Ma’s not going to be happy if Conner dents her car.</p><p> </p><p>“He, uh. I mean, he’s been inside my head more than once, Tim. He was with me, tried to help me out when I had that bad run-in with the Red Mercy, those alien nightmare plants. He… probably already knows who you are. And a lot of other people, too.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim’s stomach does its level best to hit the floor of the truck. It’s never a sure thing that anyone’s secrets are going to be kept, not with all of the hackers and magicians and god knows what else running around the world, but he still feels a little sick, lightheaded. He hates the vulnerability of it. Not so much for himself, because every time he puts his costume on he knows exactly what he’s risking, but for all of the people so intimately connected to him who he drags further and further into danger with each person who finds out something they were never meant to know. There are very few lengths he wouldn’t go to these days to protect what he has left, and this sort of thing is an ugly, painful reminder that he <em>can’t </em>protect them, that their safety is something he’s powerless to guarantee.</p><p> </p><p>“Right,” he manages after a minute, but his voice comes out sort of hoarse and broken, and he can tell by the sharp slump of Conner’s shoulders how bad it must have sounded.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m sorry, Tim,” Conner says, quiet and too real. It hurts worse to hear him sounding so low and small. “I wouldn’t have told anyone on purpose, you know that, right? I know how dangerous it is. I wouldn’t do that to you.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, Conner. I know.” He leans his head back against the seat, takes a deep breath through his nose and wills himself to relax, the tightness to ease out of his throat. It almost works.</p><p> </p><p>“I know it doesn’t make it any better, but I think Sujan’s a good guy. I do trust him.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s—that’s good,” Tim says and tries to mean it. The rest of the trip is silent.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Sujan is a friendly, sweet-faced teenager, a little younger than Lori and Simon. The sight of him makes Tim queasy. When they arrive at Sujan’s house—which, Tim learns, is actually the Valentines’ house, where Sujan has been staying in the empty bedroom Simon’s older sister left behind—they pause only long enough for Tim to be introduced to Simon’s mother before retreating to the relative privacy of the backyard. It backs up to one of the small patches of forest scattered throughout Smallville, and they cross the mottled brown and green length of the yard to head for the trees. Sujan, unsurprisingly, seems to sense the tension in the air, and watches Conner seriously as the three of them make a seat out of the trunk of a fallen tree just inside the forest, still in eyesight of the Valentine home.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks for meeting with us, Sujan,” Conner begins, rubbing the back of his neck. His posture is awkward, too upright to be casual and twisted at the waist to face Sujan almost head-on.  Sujan curls one leg up on the tree in front of himself and rests his hands on it, giving Conner his full attention.</p><p> </p><p>“Of course, Conner. You’re my friend, and… not to pry, but you seem concerned about something.” Tim notices that Sujan doesn’t seem bothered about concealing his abilities in Tim's presence. Rather than showing any apprehension about having this conversation in front of a stranger, Sujan's smile is only a little apologetic, like he feels bad about his natural insight into Conner’s emotional state. Tim wonders if Lori and her small town gossip struck again after Tim’s little show last night, or if he’s just gleaned an understanding of what Tim knows from Conner’s mind. He wants to feel better about Sujan’s apparent reluctance to invade people’s privacy, but the possibility that he may be picking up far more than he lets on keeps Tim on edge.</p><p> </p><p>“You could say that. It’s about Simon, actually, so I thought you might be the person to talk to. I wanted to ask if you've noticed anything… unusual? Have you gotten any bad vibes, or noticed him acting differently in the last few months?” Tim leans around Conner to gauge Sujan's reaction to the question; he looks thoughtful, maybe a little perplexed. They let him sit quietly and think for a minute, but eventually he shakes his head, looking regretful.</p><p> </p><p>“I can sense that you're looking to me for help or guidance with something, but I'm afraid I have nothing to offer you. I noticed a normal level of excitement and nervousness before he left for his internship in Metropolis, but nothing out of the ordinary.”</p><p> </p><p>“You said, 'his internship in Metropolis',” Tim observes, watching Sujan carefully. “Did he tell you exactly where he was interning?”</p><p> </p><p>“No,” Sujan admits, shaking his head. “He told me it was a prestigious business in Metropolis, but no details, and I didn't pry. I think he assumed I wouldn’t recognize it—he still doesn't seem to think I know anything about this time except the most major events of the century, although I've been reading several major newspapers to familiarize myself with the present. His mother never said anything, either; she's kind enough to me, but often quite busy, and we rarely speak beyond 'good morning' and 'good night’.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right,” Conner mutters, glancing uneasily at Tim. “So, he really didn’t tell anyone, huh?”</p><p> </p><p>“Is there some problem with Simon's internship?” Sujan asks, looking more concerned.</p><p> </p><p>“Sujan, it’s, um. He took an internship with LexCorp.” It’s obvious from the way that Sujan actually rocks backwards in horror that he fully grasps the implications of that statement.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, no, no….” He shakes his head and his shoulders drop as he buries his face in his hands. “No, Conner, this is very bad, this….”</p><p> </p><p>Conner looks more worried about Sujan now than the situation with Simon, reaches out to grasp his friend’s knee, ducking his head in an attempt to make eye contact. “Hey, what’s wrong? Besides the obvious ‘Lex probably trying to use Simon’s brain for evil’ thing.”</p><p> </p><p>“Lex,” Sujan repeats, barking a laugh. He looks ill, tugging at the ends of his own hair, still shaking his head. “If only Lex were the problem. Conner, I… I never told you the truth about the Prime Hunter.”</p><p> </p><p>“The… truth?” Tim’s stomach drops as Conner glances over at him, looking bewildered and scared.</p><p> </p><p>“Yes, the truth. Timothy, the Prime Hunter is a force of supreme evil in my time. He is the one who built the city-state known as Acropolis on the remains of Smallville, who created and armed the Science Hunters who now roam the city, killing and terrorizing metahumans and conscripting unpowered humans into forced labor to support the rule of the Prime Hunter.” He pauses, taking a deep breath and looking like he’s gathering his strength for whatever he’s about to say next. Looking Conner in the eye, he tells them, “Simon Valentine is the Prime Hunter.”</p><p> </p><p>They all sit in silence for what feels like a very long time, Sujan watching tensely as Conner and Tim try to wrap their minds around the bomb he’s just dropped on them. “I… what?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner is starting to look upset, and Sujan twists his hands together, his head bowed as if in apology. “I was never fully truthful with you, Conner, for which I am deeply sorry. It’s true that I was sent back to this time to learn how to defeat the Prime Hunter, but not… not by training with you, as I told you when I first arrived. My true mission in coming here was to find and kill Simon Valentine before he gathered the strength to begin his ascent to power.”<br/><br/><br/></p><p>“No,” Conner says, running a hand through his hair and shaking his head. “No, that doesn’t make any sense. <em>Simon</em>? I mean, how did I… how did I let that happen?” Sujan’s expression is one of deep sympathy, and he leans forward to place a hand on Conner’s shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m sorry, friend. The Prime Hunter was a very skilled liar, very persuasive, and you were a trusting and generous hero. By the time you realized that he would turn on you, it was already too late. He killed you in battle in the year 2043.” He glances at Tim like he wants to say more, but nothing else is forthcoming. Tim’s vision seems to have tunneled a little, the edges dark and fuzzy, and his fists are curled in his lap, knuckles creaking and nails biting so deeply that he wouldn’t be surprised to see blood. He can’t remember the last time a single sentence had managed to make him this flatly furious.</p><p> </p><p>“I knew I didn’t like that kid,” he mutters, understatement of the century, and Sujan seems to break down a little, mouth twisting with indecision.</p><p> </p><p>“It… it is true that you were always more suspicious of the Prime Hunter. Timothy, you died in the year 2031. It was discovered after Conner’s death, when Damian Wayne and Stephanie Brown assisted Cassandra Sandsmark in attacking the Prime Hunter and successfully hacked into his computer systems, that he was also the one who orchestrated your demise.”  </p><p> </p><p>Tim stops breathing, and he can see Conner go ashy grey at that revelation. It’s a very odd sensation, hearing someone who knows it for a fact tell you the exact year of your death.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow,” Tim breathes after a minute. “I guess I never really expected to make it to forty anyway, but that’s….”</p><p> </p><p>“I am very sorry,” Sujan says, voice soft and eyes sincere. “I disobeyed my orders to kill Simon because I thought that in coming here, perhaps I could influence him away from the path of evil that led to what happened in my time. But now, this news of him taking a position with Lex Luthor’s company… I’m concerned that I underestimated the difference I could make.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shakes his head, struggling to come up with something like a smile. “You did what you thought was right. Killing is rarely the answer.” It’s difficult to say <em>never</em> when the potential consequences are so stark—his own death, <em>Conner’s</em>, all the people killed and suffering in the next two centuries…. Tim wishes he could make Bruce proud here, but the thought of that, of what could be prevented, tests his commitment to Bruce’s ideals.</p><p> </p><p>“We can’t let that happen,” Conner says finally, still looking deeply shaken. It’s the most scared Tim has ever seen him, eyes wide and skin waxy, his chest rising and falling too quickly with his rapid, shallow breaths. The sight of it triggers Tim's instinct to hold it together for his friend, take charge of the situation, and he scoots closer to Conner, putting a hand on his shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner, breathe. It’s going to be okay. The first time around, we didn’t have the advantage of Sujan’s knowledge, the warning we needed to prevent it. This time, we know, and we’ll handle it.” Conner nods, but he doesn’t look much better, and he doesn’t say anything else. Sujan’s smile as he watches them is knowing and sad, and Tim shoots him a curious look, but he just shakes his head.</p><p> </p><p>“You will also have my help, in whatever capacity you feel you need it. If there is any hope of stopping him, we will find the way.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner nods slowly again, but he’s just sitting slumped, staring at his hands, still too pale for Tim’s comfort. He’s going to have to say something to Conner when they get back to the car, Tim decides—it’s not hard to guess that this is Conner figuring out a way to blame himself for Simon’s future actions, and that’s not a sort of wallowing that Tim is going to tolerate.</p><p> </p><p>“Thank you, Sujan,” he says, smiling at the boy. “We appreciate your offer, and your honesty. You’ve certainly given us a lot to think about. We’ll do some strategizing and keep you in the loop if we come up with a plan to mitigate the potential consequences.” Sujan laughs a little.</p><p> </p><p>“I can see that your reputation for sharp business acumen is well-deserved,” he says, and Tim is pretty sure the kid is <em>teasing</em> him. Tim grins back, starting to feel like maybe Sujan is alright, after all. It’s getting late, though, and Conner doesn’t seem inclined to move anytime soon, still preoccupied by whatever guilt trip he’s laid on himself, so Tim takes charge of the situation, grabbing Conner’s elbow and tugging as he stands. There’s a beat where Tim marvels at the way Conner can turn into a such a statue, utterly immovable, when he’s not paying careful attention to maintaining his human façade, and then Conner seems to catch on and allows Tim to pull him to his feet.</p><p> </p><p>“We’re going to get going, but it was really nice to meet you, Sujan. I appreciate everything you’ve done to look out for Conner—I’ll get in touch with you soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“Actually, Timothy—,”</p><p> </p><p>“Just ‘Tim’ is fine,” Tim breaks in, repressing a chuckle at how formally Sujan speaks. Without any input from his better judgement, he seems to have taken a liking to the kid. Sujan blushes a little but smiles, broad and sweet.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim,” he continues, “could I speak to you privately for a moment before you go?” Tim glances uncertainly at Conner, who’s still just staring vacantly at a tree, not having moved an inch since Tim pulled him upright.</p><p> </p><p>“Um,” he says, and reaches up to put a gentle hand on Conner’s back, stepping in close. “Conner? Are you gonna be alright getting back to the car? I’ll just be a minute, if you’re okay.” Conner swallows, Tim’s eyes following the motion of his throat, and seems to come back to himself just enough to nod. There’s a hand on Tim’s waist for just a second, a gesture that reads <em>I’m okay</em> to Tim, and he tries to fight down the stupid flush that rises as Conner begins walking back through the trees, headed for the driveway.</p><p> </p><p>Shaking his head, Tim turns back to Sujan, eyeing him curiously. “So, what is it you wanted to talk to me about?”</p><p> </p><p>Sujan looks hesitant, and holds out a hand to Tim, palm facing forward as if to wave. “For the sake of privacy,” he says, glancing meaningfully after Conner, “perhaps it would be best if I communicated this way? I can promise you that I will only transmit my thoughts to you; nothing you think will be revealed to me unless you ask me to open communication in both directions.” Tim stares at him for a long minute, deeply torn. On the one hand, every instinct screams at him not to let anyone anywhere near his brain; on the other, he figures Sujan could probably get anything he wanted to know about Tim without asking permission, anyway, so what harm can it really do?</p><p> </p><p>“…Alright,” Tim says finally, still uncomfortable with his own decision, even if he does think it’s logical. After all, if this is something truly sensitive enough to warrant such secrecy, he might really not want Conner accidentally picking up whatever Sujan is about to say. “Go ahead.”</p><p> </p><p>Sujan nods solemnly and steps forward, stopping when his hand is barely an inch from Tim’s forehead. For a second there’s nothing, and then, without warning, Tim is being flooded with images of himself in his Red Robin costume, newspaper pictures of himself attending galas, a view from someone else’s eyes of him pulling his cowl back to reveal a smiling face. <em>I will not tell anyone</em>, he hears, overlaid somehow atop the images. <em>I could sense your uncertainty and wanted you to know that I know who you are, but I promise I will protect your identity.</em> With his eyes, Tim sees Sujan smile, reassuring, and he nods slowly.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” he says out loud. He sort of wishes he didn’t know, but at the same time, Sujan’s honesty really does make him feel better. Nothing about this feels like a threat, even to Tim’s finely tuned senses, and it’s kind of nice to be on the same page with someone for once, fully honest.</p><p> </p><p>Then more disturbing images start flashing across his mind. A vision of himself watching Conner, looking far too heartbroken at the frown marring Conner’s expression. A twist of murderous fury across his own face accompanied by the intuition that what he's seeing is Sujan’s vision as he had revealed Conner’s fate to them. The sight of himself just moments ago with one hand on Conner’s back as Conner touched his waist, the two of them too close for it not to mean anything, Tim’s head tilted up towards Conner at an angle that’s more tender than Tim can bear right now. Sujan doesn’t need to add any commentary for Tim to feel the gentle accusation in the images.</p><p> </p><p>“Yes,” Tim croaks, “okay, you’re right, just—just stop it. What are you trying to tell me?”</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>I will not say anything about this, either. It is clear to me, perhaps because of my empathic abilities, but your secrets are your own, Tim. I only wanted to suggest that the pain you inflict on yourself over this may not be so warranted as you think. </em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>“Yeah, I’m sure that’s easy for you to say,” Tim mutters. He likes Sujan, but he doesn’t really appreciate the unsolicited advice about his train wreck of a love life. Obviously he <em>should</em> just be able to get over it, but his emotions have different plans at the moment, and he’s doing his best. Sujan tilts his head and gives Tim a lopsided smile, just close enough to pitying that it makes Tim suspicious.</p><p> </p><p>“I mean no offense, Tim. I have no doubt whatsoever about your abilities—you will figure things out.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right,” Tim says, still feeling a little sour, but willing to set it aside. He can’t be at war with <em>two</em> of Conner’s friends, particularly when one of the two is a murderous despot in the making and the other is just trying to help him get over his crush. “Well, thanks, Sujan. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“I hope so, Tim. It was very nice to meet you.”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Conner is leaning against the cab of the truck when Tim catches up to him, head tipped back towards the sky. Tim is kind of glad—he doesn’t seem to be in any condition to actually drive, and Tim would have a hell of a time trying to pry him out of the driver’s seat. Instead, he’s able to just pat Conner’s arm as he slips two fingers into the front pocket of Conner’s jeans, snagging the keys from him without a fight.</p><p> </p><p>“Come on, Conner. Get in the truck—let’s go home.” He gives Conner an encouraging little nudge, and it’s enough momentum for Conner to sort of tip sideways into a step forward, making his way around to the passenger door silently. Tim hops in and starts the truck, trying not to let Conner’s behavior rattle him too much.</p><p> </p><p>He lasts about five minutes, glancing over at Conner about every thirty seconds, before he caves. “Hey, are you okay?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner continues to not speak, and if he were anyone else, Tim would be wondering if Conner hadn’t heard him. Finally, he opens his mouth.</p><p> </p><p>“I let him kill you, Tim.” Tim blinks. That is <em>not</em> what he was expecting.</p><p> </p><p>“What?”</p><p> </p><p>“I let him kill you,” Conner repeats. “I wanted to believe in the good in everyone so much that I got you fucking murdered at <em>thirty-five</em> and I didn’t even suspect him. Not to mention the tens or hundreds of thousands of other people he’s also killed or enslaved or god knows what else.” Tim needs a second to process that, so he does what he does best—stalls.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, well, first of all, thirty-five is actually a pretty good life expectancy for a Robin,” he says, and he can’t see what it is, but he hears metal crunch somewhere on Conner's side of the truck. From the look on Conner’s face, that was obviously not the right place to start.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim, do <em>not</em> joke about shit like that—”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay! Sorry, just trying to, um. Lighten the mood. My point, though, is that someone else deciding to be a scumbag murderer and taking me out behind your back is absolutely not your fault. It’s also not your fault if they kill anybody else—I know we take it on as our responsibility not to let anyone get hurt, but if they do, it is <em>always</em> going to be the fault of the person who did the hurting. That’s not on you.” Conner is looking out the window now, still unhappy and uncertain, but it’s better than the blank, thousand-yard stare he’s been sporting for the last half hour.</p><p> </p><p>“Also,” Tim continues, “it’s really not ever a bad thing to look for the good in others. I understand how betrayed you must feel after finding out that a close friend did all of that, but if a few people turn out to be truly irredeemable, that doesn’t blow your whole theory of fundamental goodness out of the water. It’s really, really admirable that you don’t want to give up on people, Conner. We need people like you.”</p><p> </p><p>He really means that, too. He knows where Conner’s stalwart determination to believe the best in others comes from, the leftover hope that perhaps, one day, Lex will show some remorse or do something genuinely good. It’s rooted in his own fears, and as much as it hurts Tim that Conner still worries about what he’s going to become, it makes Tim feel a little more balanced to know that Conner is always looking for the bright side. He doesn’t want his friend to lose that light, beating himself over something that doesn’t even need to happen.</p><p> </p><p>Conner exhales harshly, finally drags his eyes over to meet Tim’s. Tim smiles at him, a little rawer than he wants it to be when Conner is looking for strength, but Conner smiles back anyway.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re really good at this stuff, you know that?” he asks, and Tim shoots him a sideways glance, confused.</p><p> </p><p>“The whole pep talk thing. Making me feel better.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Tim says, and has to turn his eyes back to the road, unable to concentrate when he thinks about the warm, fond way Conner is looking at him. “Well, um. I don’t think anyone has ever accused me of that before, but—that’s good. Maybe we’re just the same type of fucked up,” he offers, another pathetic attempt at a joke. Why is all of his humor so morbid?</p><p> </p><p>Conner does chuckle this time, though, a low, rough sound that twists something down in Tim’s gut. “Maybe. I think I’m okay with that.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I had a lot of fun writing this chapter!! I'm really enjoying writing Tim interacting with Kon's Smallville cast and also Tim being like, wildly out of the loop in his own life lol?? </p><p>Also just want to say thank you really quick to everyone leaving kudos and comments, especially the repeat commenters!! You guys are all so sweet and supportive and it means a ton, thanks for wanting to come along on this ride with me! Love you guys!!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim's personal life is as tangled as his new hobby, and shows no signs of improving.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello again!! Welcome back to another wildly self-indulgent, barely-edited chapter lol, you all know what we're doing here. </p>
<p>Also real quick, thank you so much to everyone who left a comment on the last chapter, yall are so sweet and funny and it made me soooo happy reading your comments&lt;333 And shout out to the absurdly nice person who requested cuddles?? Does this count? Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tim wakes up in the middle of the night.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That’s unusual enough in and of itself—generally once Tim is out, he’s basically a warm corpse for the next eight to ten hours, at least according to his family. He had once awoken from a peaceful slumber to Dick and Bruce’s disbelief and mild concern that he hadn’t heard lightning strike the tree directly outside his window at the manor. At one particularly low point a few months ago, he’d fallen and stayed asleep at professional baseball game, resulting in some extremely embarrassing paparazzi photos of Bruce having to carry him back to the car. When Tim sleeps, Tim <em>sleeps</em>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>So it’s disorienting to suddenly come awake in the dark like this, and it takes him a minute to realize that he can’t actually move. Not in a sleep paralysis way—he’s not seeing any unsettling hallucinations creeping in the corner of his vision, and he can tense his muscles in a way that he knows from years of training definitely <em>should</em> result in some sort of movement. Instead, it’s like there’s something holding him in place. That’s bad enough, deeply worrying when he’s just finished having some fairly extensive discussions about all of the possible consequences of a Simon Valentine-Lex Luthor team-up. What’s worse is when the invisible force starts <em>dragging</em> him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The weird thing is that it’s dragging him backwards—he had been asleep facing the window, as is his habit, and now he’s being pulled off the air mattress towards Conner’s bed, his shoulder and hip making painful contact with the floor as he slips off the edge. If this is someone’s way of trying to steal him out of the Kent house, they’re going the wrong direction. His ankle makes contact with one of the legs of Conner’s bed, and suddenly he’s lifting <em>up</em>, pulling away from the floor, and he realizes exactly what’s happening.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner,” Tim says at a conversational volume. If his heartbeat has been enough to wake Conner up, that’s certainly going to do the trick. Sure enough, he drops an alarming inch back towards the floor before stopping, the invisible pressure holding him in place as it begins shifting around his body, presumably Conner trying to suss out what he’s doing with his own TTK. The sensation is deeply weird, but not unpleasant, like the waves of a dry ocean rolling over his shoulders and stomach.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Mn—Tim?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hey,” Tim says, bracing himself for Conner to drop him completely. The rippling motion fades away as the TTK stills, but Conner doesn’t let go. “Um. Is this just where I sleep now, or…?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Huh? Oh,” Conner mumbles, seeming to realize that he can’t leave Tim hanging six inches above his bedroom floor forever. The pressure under his torso stays in place, supporting him, but he feels the portion of Conner’s TTK that had been wrapped around his back pull away, allowing him the freedom to roll off onto the floor. “Sorry, man. Dunno what that was about.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>His voice his thick and gravelly with sleep, but Tim can still hear the guilt in it. Pushing himself to his knees, he leans up to rest his arms on the edge of Conner’s bed. “You know you can’t lie to a liar, right?” he asks, and Conner’s eyes are still mostly closed, but he heaves a deep sigh.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You lie to Batman,” Conner mutters, and Tim grins.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, but I’m actually <em>good</em> at lying.” Conner snorts and flops over onto his stomach, burying his face in the pillow.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You should go back to sleep,” he says, so muffled that Tim can barely understand him, and Tim decides immediately that that’s just not an option. The only times he’s heard anything about Conner having trouble controlling his TTK in his sleep have been the rare occasions that he’s well and truly upset about something, so unsettled that his brain is still active enough in sleep to direct the power. Usually in those situations they’ve ended up having to patch a hole in the wall of Titans Tower after Conner has accidentally rocketed his alarm clock out into San Francisco Bay, so if Conner is getting all unconsciously grabby, something is obviously up.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That actually doesn’t sound like such a great idea to me,” Tim says, picking himself up to sit on the edge of Conner's bed. “I know you've got school in the morning and all, but I kind of feel like if something is upsetting you this much, we should probably talk about it.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Bruce would have a heart attack if he heard you say that,” Conner tells him, and Tim crooks a smile at the back of his friend's head.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, well. Bruce isn’t here, so 'fess up. What's the problem?” Conner rolls back over to face Tim, curling a hand in the thin summer blanket pulled up to his ribs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m just… still kinda freaked about the whole Simon thing, I guess. It was bad enough when I thought it was just Lex worming his way back into my life, fucking with my friends, but now…. It's Simon himself, you know? All of my friends and family here are in danger <em>from</em> one of my friends. And not even just the people here, right? <em>You</em>, he….” Conner trails off, and Tim sighs and hauls himself further up on the bed, propping one bare foot up on the mattress and leaning back against the headboard.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner, don't worry about me, okay? You know I can take care of myself.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Except you couldn't,” Conner says, so quiet Tim can barely hear him. The tension in Conner's shoulders is obvious even in the dark, and Tim presses his lips together tightly. “What does that mean for everybody else? You’re the smartest, toughest person I know, and he <em>killed </em>you, Tim. And I lived <em>twelve</em> <em>more</em> <em>years</em> and—and didn't even figure it out.” A little bit of life goes out of his voice at the end, flat and sad, and Tim doesn’t know what to do about that. For lack of a better plan, he settles for taking his own cue.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I wish I could say something to make it better,” he admits. “It’s an awful feeling, being scared for the people you love. Suffocating. If we're doing honesty hour, it's probably not too hard to guess that that's mostly why I throw myself into work as much as I can, right? It hit me hard when I lost you—you were the one person I was never supposed to have to worry about, the Boy of Steel, and you were gone anyway. It didn’t make sense, and all of the sudden nothing was safe. Work became the one thing that did make sense; it at least feels like something I can<em> do</em>, some tangible way of making the world safer. The more criminals I put away, the fewer there are out there running around, killing the people I love.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Picking up a hand from his lap, he flexes it, watches the skin pull tight around all of the delicate bones. Recalls the sensation of those knuckles bruising and breaking against jaws and ribs, the pain never enough to overwhelm the grief. “But there’s no control, Conner, never. No matter how hard I work. It’s terrifying.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He feels more than sees Conner staring at him, heavy gaze from somewhere down by Tim’s hip, neck craned to look up at him. Tim takes pity on him and scoots down a little, stays carefully close to the edge of the bed as he lays down on his side to face Conner properly. “So, I dunno if that exciting pep talk helps at all. You’re supposed to feel this way, I think, is the point. Caring hurts, but it’s pretty important for a superhero, especially one as powerful as you are. Really annoying that you’re so good at it, huh?” The smile he gives Conner is sleepy, but as real and reassuring as he can make it. Conner is quiet for a while, and Tim’s eyelids start to droop again in the silence. This bed is too comfortable—Tim doesn’t trust it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Can I hug you?” That’s really not what Tim was expecting to hear come out of Conner’s mouth, but he’s tired and <em>sleepy</em> and Conner is looking at him like maybe things will be okay, and how can he say no to that? So, in a move that will no doubt mortify him when he wakes up again, he shrugs and wriggles a little closer to Conner.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Guess I haven’t reached my quota for the week yet,” he says, and Conner uses his damned TTK to pull Tim the rest of the way in, enveloping him in a sort of invisible, full-body hug in addition to wrapping strong arms around him. It’s alarmingly soothing, and Tim decides that he’s going to have to start putting some space between himself and Conner if he wants to avoid saying or doing something that they’ll both regret. In the morning, maybe. For now, he’s pretty okay just laying here, one arm tucked against his chest and the other around Conner’s waist as Conner holds him close.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They stay that way for what feels like a long time. It's cozy and safe and even the sensation of Conner's body pressed against his at a hundred different points, which usually would have been enough to damn near overload Tim's system with adrenaline, just feels… right. Tim's brain starts to shut down (more than it already has; he <em>definitely</em> wouldn’t have let this happen if he were fully awake, he assures himself), and he makes one last, feeble effort as he starts to sink into the soft darkness of sleep.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“K’n?” he mumbles, muffled by his cheek pressed firmly into Conner's pillow.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Shhhhh,” Conner says, the gentle hiss of his breath ruffling Tim's hair. Tim's not awake to hear him begin to snore a second later.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>*</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Waking up is a troublingly familiar experience. He’s way, way too comfortable, would probably be happy to stay like this all day if he could. This time, instead of tucked facing one another, Conner is on his back with Tim’s head on his chest, and Tim has one arm wrapped around Conner’s waist and a calf hooked over Conner’s knee. An arm curled around Tim’s shoulders is holding him securely in place, and Tim takes the liberty of wiggling slightly, letting out a long breath as he resettles himself against Conner’s side.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Morning,” Conner says, his voice still husky from sleep, and Tim freezes as full, humiliating consciousness breaks over him like a cold wave.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Um. Morning.” His voice does <em>not</em> crack, and if it does, well, he just woke up anyway. He feels the rise and fall of Conner’s chest stutter with silent laughter and graciously chooses to ignore it. Instead of figuring out a way to jam a knee or an elbow into some tender part of Conner’s body, he tips his head back to glance up, hoping to subtly assess the damage. It’s a huge mistake, he realizes too late, because Conner is looking back at him from mere inches away with an expression on his face that Tim isn’t expecting, doesn’t recognize.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Didn’t wanna wake you,” Conner says, not seeming bothered by Tim throwing a wrench in his morning routine. Rather than annoyance or impatience or even mockery, there’s a smile on his face. One that Tim would categorize as soft, amused, if he were pressed, and his eyes are still half-lidded, observing Tim with a look that Tim can’t categorize at all. It makes his breath catch, heart thumping so loudly that he can hear it in his own ears—Conner is bound to notice. The intensity of his own response scares him a little, and he clamps down hard as his body tries to betray him, strangling the shudder of electric heat that slides down his spine in tandem with the chill of panic.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Using the hand on Conner’s chest, he levers himself up and away hard as adrenaline floods his system, demanding flight. Conner lets him go without resistance, arm falling away as Tim sits back, putting vital inches between them. The smile on Conner's face fades as he sits up, eyeing Tim warily as Tim tries to force himself to stop overreacting.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sorry,” Tim says. The urge to start babbling bubbles in his chest, and he suppresses that, too, can’t believe he’s calling on his training for <em>this</em>. “I didn’t mean to pass out on you again. I promise I’ll sleep in my own bed from now on.”  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>He manages a smile, a self-deprecating chuckle, works to make it a joke, and Conner looks… almost sad. Tim doesn’t know how to process that.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Right,” he says, rubbing a hand over the back of his head and hooking a corner of his mouth up, that weird not-smile that Tim hates. “No worries. It was a weird day yesterday.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim nods, as if this explains his behavior, and moves quickly to slip out of the bed entirely, getting as much space around himself as he can. The change in Conner’s expression makes him feel like he’s made a mistake, but he’s not sure what he could have done, and that puts him on edge.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No kidding.” Tim doesn’t have to fake the bitter smile this time—yesterday had gone so wildly wrong that it’s actually kind of funny in hindsight, the sick, unhappy sort of funny that Tim is beginning to associate with sleep deprivation. Things always seem worse when he’s tired, and he’s noticing the difference more the longer he stays with the Kents. There’s a much stronger correlation between the hours of sleep he gets and how heavy the pit of his stomach feels, how terrible things seem, than he’s been admitting to himself for the last few years. It explains a lot, actually. His broken coping mechanism had probably kicked off the downward spiral that Bruce had been trying to put a stop to in sending Tim here, the grief and fear only intensified by every night he’d spent working himself numb.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He thinks it’s probably a bad sign that he feels so hollowed out and empty after yesterday’s conversations when he feels perfectly well-rested, even with the middle-of-the-night interruption. That’s going to have to be a problem for later, though, because Conner is still just sitting there, looking more forlorn than Tim can account for. “Um, did I make you late for school?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Huh?” Conner snaps out of whatever reverie he’d been in, glances out the window and shakes his head. “Nah, I can just speed up the chores. Freaks the chickens out, but they’ll get over it.” He starts moving then, pushing himself out of bed to collect his clothes and glasses. “I can’t believe you actually woke up this early, though. When I said the farm would make you a morning person, I was kind of expecting it to take at least a couple of weeks.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“It’s the damn sun,” Tim complains, moving to rifle through the clean but wrinkled clothes still shoved into his duffle bag. Conner had offered to clear a drawer for him, but Tim had declined, not wanting to either impose or put himself in any closer proximity to Conner than strictly necessary. He’s spent plenty of time living out of suitcases, anyway, almost more used to that than having a permanent space to keep anything. “It gets in my eyes and I can’t stay asleep. Believe me, I’d rather.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I bet,” Conner says, and, blessedly, changes into his school clothes at super-speed. He’s heading for the door as Tim pulls his sleep shirt off to begin swapping out his pajamas for what’s becoming his running outfit, but stops in his tracks and turns back. As soon as his eyes land on Tim’s half-naked form he looks away, and Tim is forced to wonder if he’s finally realized the truth of the situation, if Tim has given himself away, after all, or if he’s just embarrassed about earlier. Either way, Tim yanks the shirt over his head as quickly as he can without the advantage of superpowers.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What’s up?” he asks, and Conner glances back, shakes his head.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Nothing, I just, uh. Realized I completely forgot about my homework last night. I’ll try to work on it on the way.”</p>
<p><br/><br/>“Don’t you walk?” Tim asks, raising an eyebrow. Conner blushes, and it shouldn’t be adorable on a man of his size.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Well, I can just do it and then fly in. Probably.” He checks his watch and makes a face, and Tim sighs and stands up, moving to shoo Conner out the door.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Listen, go do your chores, okay? <em>Just this once</em>, I’ll do it for you. I’ll write the answers down and you can just copy them onto the worksheets. That shouldn’t take long. We’re just lucky you didn’t have any papers due.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You don’t have to—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I don’t help you because I have to,” Tim tells him, continuing to corral him towards the door. He’s getting a handle on this whole farm thing already, he thinks. “Go. I’ll be down in a minute.”<br/><br/></p>
<p>Conner gives him one last, hesitant look before Tim shuts the door firmly in his face. Relief washes over him instantly, and he lets himself fully sit down on the floor in the middle of Conner’s bedroom, leaning back on his hands as he tries to figure out what the hell has happened between Conner and himself in the last twelve hours. It feels impossible to parse, the rapid transitions in both of their battered emotional states so tangled up in the dual mires of fear and sleep that Tim loses track of what really happened and what he only <em>wants</em> to have happened. It really did seem like Conner was almost… disappointed when Tim had jumped away from him this morning. Had he somehow upset Conner in his rush to put a safe distance between them?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Shaking his head, he pushes himself to his knees and finishes getting dressed to run—if he’s ever needed the chance to clear his head, it’s now, and Conner is probably nearly finished the chores if he’s using his super-speed. Tim has homework to do, something he’s never once in his life thought he’d be grateful for.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>*</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Are you alright, dear?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ma has been watching Tim pace between the kitchen and the living room for the last twenty minutes, and when he snaps out of his daze, the look on her face makes it obvious that she’s genuinely worried about him. He runs a hand through his hair for probably the thirtieth time since he woke up this morning—it has to look like a bird’s nest (Conner would make a joke about that, he thinks), and he makes an effort to quiet himself physically, if nothing else.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, I’m okay. Sorry, Ma. Just… a lot happened yesterday, and I don’t think I can do anything about most of it, but it’s….”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He begins to drift away again, and Ma’s kind, firm voice pulls him back to reality. “Tim, why don’t you sit down?” Patting the seat next to her on the couch, she gives him a smile that makes it clear that it’s not a suggestion. Tim is sort of grateful; following directions is something he can manage, at least.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Can you tell me what’s bothering you?” Tim can tell she’s used to people keeping secrets from her; on the one hand, he sort of wants to tell her about what they learned yesterday, let her give him practical advice about the whole thing, but she’s Conner’s family, not his. He settles for shrugging.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner and I… we got some worrying information about a friend yesterday. It seemed like things were okay last night, but I think I did… <em>something</em> this morning, because Conner is acting weird now. Everything seemed pretty normal, though, so I’m not sure what happened.” Ma raises her eyebrows at him, and somehow it’s not entirely judgmental, only patient, as if she knows that’s not the whole truth. Sighing, Tim pulls his bare feet up on the couch and hooks his arms around his knees. “We had kind of an awkward moment, I guess? But it’s not like we <em>fought</em> or anything, so I don’t know why he seemed so bothered. It was just kind of a… personal space issue. It seemed like I hurt his feelings?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Saying it out loud, it occurs to Tim that while Conner had admitted to Tim that he’s not as straight as Tim had always assumed, Tim had kept his own revelations about his sexuality to himself. Had he upset Conner by not wanting to be near him, made him think that Tim was uncomfortable being close to him now? After all, they’ve been plenty physical with each other lately, but mostly in public, where it’s been important to keep up the appearance of a relationship. Even last night could be explained away as Tim overcoming his discomfort in order to be a good friend to Conner; of course Tim panicking about the first casual form of physical affection Conner had engaged in with him would give Conner the wrong impression.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh, no,” Tim says out loud. He turns to make eye contact with Ma, horrified by his revelation. “I definitely hurt his feelings. Wow, I’m a terrible friend.” Ma is looking at him, sort of amused and sympathetic at the same time, and reaches down to pat his knee kindly.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Well, if you know what the problem is, then you can find a way to fix it. Don’t be too hard on yourself, Tim.” Tim is pretty sure she can tell from the look on his face that “not being too hard on himself”, while a lovely sentiment, isn’t a realistic expectation for Tim. Particularly in <em>this</em> situation; he’s kind of astonished with himself, that he’d managed to get so wrapped up in his own problems as to fuck up something this fundamental so monumentally. “Would you like me to show you how to do this?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ma is holding up what she has in her hands, a hook and a strand of yarn that turns, at some indiscernible point, into a scarf. “Is that… crochet?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ma smiles at him, looking pleased. “Yes! I’m impressed; most people think any sort of yarn work is knitting.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Jason knits,” Tim says, watching as Ma’s hands continue to move. She barely glances down, feeding the yarn steadily through her fingers and turning loops into fabric. It’s sort of fascinating to watch, honestly. “He has <em>very</em> strong feelings about people mixing the two up.” She laughs at the pained face Tim is making and reaches down to pull out another ball of yarn and a hook, offering them to Tim.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“If you’d like to learn, I’m happy to teach you. It might be a good distraction, and once you’ve got the hang of it, I find it very soothing.” She gives him one of those warm, knowing smiles, and Tim only hesitates for a second before he nods, reaching out to take the unfamiliar objects from her. He likes Ma and is happy to spend more time with her, and she’s probably right to hint that it would be good for him. It won’t hurt to have a hobby to keep him busy while he’s here, anyway.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Go ahead and make a slip knot and I’ll show you how to get started,” she tells him, not setting her own work aside. He does as she asks and follows her instructions as best as he can, tucking the hook into the loop and beginning to pull yarn through. A few minutes later he has a chain, nearly a foot long and decidedly wobbly-looking.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner is gonna make fun of me for this, isn’t he?” Tim mutters, staring in consternation at the unsteady loops, some so loose they look ready to fall apart, others pulled into tight little knots.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What, for crocheting?” Ma looks surprised, raising her eyebrows at him, like it’s a silly thing for him to have asked. Trying not to blush, he shrugs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Well, sort of. Doing it this badly, is more what I meant.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh, dear,” she says, finally putting down her hook to pat his knee again. It’s a sweet, grandmotherly gesture, and Tim can’t bring himself to mind the familiarity. “Conner knows what it’s like to be a beginner. The only thing he’s going to make fun of you for is picking the wrong craft. He’s on your brother’s side of the yarn war, you know,” she tells him, winking.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Wait—he knits?” Tim is astonished, and it must show, because Ma tips her head back and laughs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“He never told you? He picked it up from me a while back; I’m happy doing either, and Conner was looking for a way to focus, keep himself grounded. When he’s feeling anxious, he knits scarves and hats and donates them to shelters in Metropolis in the winter.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That’s… pretty cute, actually,” Tim says, distracted by the mental image of Conner clutching two needles, brow furrowed as he works up a square of fabric. He realizes a second later that maybe it’s not especially wise to call his crush “cute” in front of said crush’s <em>mom</em>, but Martha’s made it pretty clear that she heavily suspects, at the very least, and it’s nice not to have to censor himself around her.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I think it’s nice,” Ma agrees, a fond smile creasing her face. “If you keep practicing, the two of you can sit and make scarves together like a couple of old men.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The thought is strangely pleasant, and Tim looks down at the mangled string in his hands. He’d been feeling a little discouraged about it, but it seems sweeter now, lighter, less like a failure and more like a beginning. He picks the hook back up.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>*</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim has a few lumpy practice squares by the time Conner gets back from school, and Conner grins when he sees the hook in Tim’s hand, picking one of the squares up to observe it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Nice work,” he says, fingering the stitches. Tim knows for a fact that it is <em>not</em> nice work; his tension is still wonky, the stitches completely different sizes in places where he was feeling more or less stressed or distracted, moving from tight to open and back again in the space of a single row. Still, Conner looks proud of him, and Tim will take that any day. “Ma’s a genius, huh? We should really start getting more people to do this kind of thing. We’ve got a lot of friends who could stand to chill out a little.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim can’t help it—he pictures Bruce, Bart, <em>Guy Gardner</em> sitting around making hats and baby booties and bursts out laughing. “That’s a great idea,” he agrees when he can breathe again. Conner is still grinning at him, and Tim is just glad to see he might not have permanently fucked up their friendship. “You never told me you knew how to knit.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner shrugs, takes a seat at the kitchen table across from Tim and starts pulling out his books. “It just never came up, I guess? I mostly do it when I need to think, and usually if I’m with you, I’m either hanging out with friends or punching bad guys. Not a lot of thinking time in the schedule.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim hums skeptically, smirks at Conner over his hook and yarn, but says nothing as Conner puts his head down to start his homework. He’s still smirking when Conner glances back up; he catches him out and Conner blushes, ducks his head again. It really is adorable, Conner keeping such an innocent hobby secret; he donates the results to <em>charity</em>, for god’s sake. It’s sort of a nice change of pace to find out something harmless and pleasant that Conner has been keeping from him, rather than something nightmarishly awful. It makes him worry a little, though, that Conner might think Tim is actually laughing at his expense, especially after the incident this morning.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You know I think it’s cool, though, right?” Tim asks a few minutes later, as Conner is digging into his trigonometry homework. Conner looks up, not quite meeting Tim’s eyes, and if he were anybody else, Tim would think he was acting shy. “And Ma said you donate what you make. You’re really that thoughtful even in your spare time?” He’s joking, but Conner’s shoulders rise, and he fiddles with the pencil in his hand, waggling it nervously back and forth between two fingers. He <em>definitely</em> looks shy now.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I wasn’t hiding it because I thought you would make fun of me or anything. It really did just never come up, but… I’m glad you don’t think it’s dumb.” Tim laughs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’ve done plenty of things over the years that were extremely dumb, Conner, and I’m pretty sure I’ve let you know exactly how dumb they were in extensive detail, every single time. Knitting is not one of those things.” Conner smiles at him, genuine, and his shoulders begin to relax again. Tim is glad to see it; he wouldn’t have thought his opinion mattered that much, but it makes him feel warm in a way that radiates from the pit of his stomach, his best friend trusting him with something so small but special, the fact that he can reassure Conner like this. Maybe he’s not so awful at the whole friend thing, after all.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“…So, since I’m in on the secret now, are you going to make <em>me</em> a hat?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>*</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim spends most of the evening practicing his double crochets, only putting it down to help when Conner starts grumbling over his homework. Even when Ma goes up for the night and they migrate to the living room, Tim opts to just watch from the couch as Conner plays Paper Mario on the ancient GameCube still hooked up to Ma’s TV. Using the term “watch” very loosely, since he spends most of his time glaring at the yarn in his hands, trying to count his stitches and figure out why he’s coming up one short in each row, slowly turning his square into a triangle. When Conner starts talking, it takes him a second to tune back in.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“So, I did tell you we could go check out that crime scene,” Conner says, dragging Tim out of the state of deep focus he’s fallen into. “You still wanna go, or are we heading to bed like normal people?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Pulling out his phone, Tim checks the time; it’s 11:46, late enough that almost everyone in Smallville's little farming community should be asleep. Even Conner is looking a little worn down, and Tim hesitates. “Do you mind? You’ve had a pretty long day. We don’t have to if you'd rather go to bed—we could go tomorrow.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner shakes his head. “It’s already been the better part of a week—in Metropolis, they would’ve had the whole thing cleaned up yesterday. You know half the reason the tape stays up so long is because they’re not that efficient at working crime scenes since they hardly ever have to do it, but they just had to process a scene last week. They’ll probably be moving quicker since they’re on higher alert, too; if you wanna go, we should do it tonight.” Tim chews his lip; Conner’s not wrong, but he still feels bad, dragging Conner out of the house at this hour after such a hard week.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’d like to go, but honestly, I can just walk. Or if you have a bike or something I could borrow….” Conner laughs, puts the controller down and stands up to stretch.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You wanna ride Daisy into town?” he asks, referencing the sweet old mare who resides in the barn and has a penchant for drooling on people’s shirts. The look Tim gives him is scathing, and Conner snickers again, moving to shut the console down. “It’s fine, I can give you a ride. Since I’m not managing to stop these things, I should probably be trying to investigate them, anyway. We'll be helping each other out.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim sets his stitch practice aside and rolls his neck, working out the tension that’s started to form there from hunching over for most of the day. He’s already begun to forget that his neck usually feels that way all the time, and wonders how hard it’s really going to be to transition back to real life after a whole summer of this. They pause by the front door to collect their shoes, and Tim figures at least this time he isn’t going to be in his pajamas. Already a step in the right direction.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Following Conner out into the night, they head for the deep shadows along the side of the barn, Conner nearly disappearing into the dark to Tim’s unaccustomed eyes. His vision is pretty good in the dark even without the help of the enhancements in his cowl, but the moon is behind a bank of clouds, and the night is a sort of inky pitch black that’s hard to find even in Gotham. He moves cautiously, trying not to trip, and ends up nearly jumping out of his skin when he walks directly into something warm and firm and feels an arm come up around his waist, a hand on his back steadying him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Jesus,” he mutters, thumping what he has to assume is Conner’s chest with the side of his fist. Conner lets go of him instantly, backing off so suddenly that Tim sways without the support.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sorry,” Conner says, and there’s something in his tone that makes Tim’s stomach clench. Guilt, he reminds himself. He feels guilty about this morning, and he needs to put his big vigilante pants on and apologize for being an asshole, even if it had been completely accidental. Taking a half step forward, he reaches out until his fingers brush some part of Conner’s t-shirt, praying silently that he’s not touching him anywhere too awkward.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“It’s okay, you can come back. You just startled me. Just let me know when you’re going to stop walking next time, will you? Not all of us have built-in night vision.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Right, sorry. I guess I’m so used to switching by now that I forgot your eyes don’t do that.” He steps back in, and although Tim knows exactly how big Conner is, something about the mass of him, hovering just at the edge of Tim’s senses in the dark, sort of takes Tim’s breath away. <em>Not</em> the time, he reminds himself. “Uh, I’m gonna pick you up now?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim nods, and Conner puts a hand on his shoulder first, as if he’s trying extra hard to telegraph his intentions now, before hooking an arm around Tim’s waist again. He’s holding him at an unnatural angle so their bodies are nearly side-by-side, as if he’s trying to touch Tim as little as possible, and Tim’s chest and head and stomach all ache simultaneously. They take off, and as they rise above the barn, the darkness pales into something more comfortable, something that at least lets Tim glimpse the outline of Conner’s jaw, his profile, against the overcast sky.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner, can I, um. Can I talk to you?” Tim knows he has to do this now, in the silence of flight; once they touch down in town, he’ll be conveniently distracted by the crime scene, and then he’ll keep finding reasons not to say anything, and then he really <em>will</em> be a horrible friend.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Uh, sure. What’s up?” It’s still a touch too dark to really make out Conner’s expression, but he sounds wary, like maybe he wants to say no.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I just wanted to say something about this morning. I kind of jumped away from you when I woke up, and it seemed like maybe I upset you, or hurt your feelings. I just wanted to let you know that it—it wasn’t about your sexuality, okay? I'm sorry if I upset you, but I wasn’t freaked out because of what you told me. I just… I guess I’m just not used to being in that kind of situation. With anyone. Of any gender. Or sexual orientation. Or. I’m going to stop talking now.” He can feel Conner shaking, and based on the tiny snort that escapes him, Tim assumes it’s with repressed laughter.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Man, Tim, you know I love you, but you are <em>so</em> bad at this stuff,” Conner gasps, and Tim feels something full and warm swell in his chest at that casual declaration of affection. “It’s okay, bud. I was a little surprised since you seemed fine the first time, but I promise I didn’t think it was because you had suddenly turned homophobic on me. And you didn’t like, emotionally devastate me or anything by not wanting to snuggle with me.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay,” Tim says, but twists his fingers together, pushing one thumb into the other palm as he tries to settle down. He doesn’t correct Conner's assumption about not <em>wanting</em> to. “I mean, it’s not like I’ve always been great about that stuff, different sexualities and that kind of thing. When I was a kid….”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Dude, come on. If we’re counting shitty stuff we did as kids, I’m pretty sure that makes me an aggressive, male chauvinist creep. We can use our adult brains now, and I know your adult brain wasn’t upset about cuddling another boy. We’re good, Tim.” As if to prove the point, he shifts Tim so that they’re pressed closer together, more like their usual carry, his side searing hot through the front of Tim’s t-shirt in the cool night air. Tim lets his self-control slip just a little, for Conner’s sake, he tells himself, and rests his cheek against Conner’s shoulder.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Just as long as I didn’t hurt your feelings. I don’t want to upset you, especially not about something like that.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Nah,” Conner says, and he sounds almost wistful. Tim isn't sure what to make of that. “Not about that. No worries.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They start to descend before Tim can ask him what <em>that</em> means, and the moment passes. This time Conner dips them down below the row of businesses that fronts Main Street and skims low through the alley behind until they’re near the top of the street. Slowing to a halt, he places Tim carefully on the ground, making sure Tim has his balance before letting him go and following him out to the sidewalk. They emerge a few buildings down and on the opposite side of the street from the jewelry store, which is easy to spot with the yellow police tape still up in front of it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim doesn’t waste any time crossing the street; he wants to get in and out as quickly as he can. The investigation will certainly be a change of pace, but even though it had been his idea, it’s starting to feel like a distraction from bigger problems. Ducking under the tape, he heads toward the window, and Conner scoops him up again before he can say anything, carrying him over the shattered glass to the inside of the store.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That’s Ma’s doctor next door,” Conner says, quiet but conversational.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh yeah?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Inside is… a little less weird than the toy store, at first glance. Most of the cases stand open and empty, which Tim takes to mean that the store had actually been following proper security measures. Only one of the cases is smashed; Tim can’t tell if that’s because there had been something in it, or if it was a random act of violence. Considering the last crime scene, Tim’s not sure what to expect from this burglar.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Mhm,” Conner says, keeping his feet off the ground as he peers around. “I had to go to him once for a physical before I could re-enroll at school because Mid-Nite was off-world. That guy thinks I am <em>sick</em>.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I assume you don’t mean he thinks you’re really cool.” Tim leads him into the back offices briefly, sticking his head in a few doors and seeing no sign that the robbers had found of interest here, before heading back out into the showroom and crossing through a short hall to a storage space. It’s mostly filled with old paperwork, but there’s a door to a flight of stairs to the far left. It’s been left hanging open, and Tim starts descending without a second thought.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I mean, probably. But no, I meant I confused the hell out of him, medically speaking. I look like a big, healthy farm boy, which is kind of what we’re angling for here, but apparently my Kryptonian physiology shows up enough in a check-up to really freak doctors out. He said I had a serious heart murmur and my blood pressure was fucked, basically. Couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t half the size and fainting constantly.” Tim snorts as he reaches the bottom of the stairs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Poor guy,” he says, before he’s distracted again by observing the lower level of the store. The basement is cavernous in the most literal sense, so old and neglected that some parts of the floor look like someone had simply whitewashed over the bedrock. Down here are the large safes which used to contain whatever merchandise wasn’t on the floor, all standing open and completely bare. Taking a moment to pull his phone out, Tim realizes he has no reception here, and looks to Conner.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hey, do you know if there have been any reports yet about anything stolen?” Conner shrugs, floating on the other side of the room, examining what appear to be old stacks of holiday decorations.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“The Ledger reported this morning that they tripped the silent alarm and were gone by the time to police got here. Merchandise was stolen, but not much. A few cheap necklaces; report said less than five hundred dollars’ worth of inventory was missing.” Turning to look at where Tim stands before the safes, he adds, “I’m guessing whatever was in there was moved by the owners after the fact.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hmm,” Tim says, and heads for the stairs, following Conner back up out of the basement. He’s sort of glad to be out of the room; he’s plenty used to caves, but generally they’re not as cramped as that one. This time, he heads straight for the back door as they emerge back onto the first floor—there’s hardly anything to look at inside the store. Same as last time, the paperwork and supplies in the offices and back room had appeared untouched, but at the toy shop, there had been chaos everywhere, with shelves overturned and merchandise scattered. The owners of this store seem to run a tighter ship, and there hadn’t been much to work with for a burglar looking to create chaos.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner opens the back door ahead of Tim without Tim even needing to ask this time, letting them back out into the night. “Was it locked?” Tim asks, and Conner shakes his head.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Nope. Still sloppy. Definitely the same person.” Tim steps outside; there’s not much to see here, either, just the double doors at the back of the building behind the jewelry store and brick walls in either direction. Tim can just see the edge of a dumpster around the corner, and heads around to inspect it. His life is really the same wherever he goes, he muses as he glances around the dumpster and towards the street. Crime scenes. Dumpster diving for clues. Same shit, different scenery. He turns to find Conner staring at him, apprehension written across his face.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re not… gonna climb in the dumpster, are you?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Maybe.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Dude, I’m gonna have to fly you back. Can it not be while you smell like two-week-old salami?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’ve flown me places while I’ve smelled much worse than that. And while <em>you’ve</em> smelled much worse than that, actually. Are your sensibilities getting delicate in your old age?” Still, he does his best for Conner, crouching down to examine the asphalt around the dumpster first. Unfortunately, there’s no dirt or grass here, little to go on except a few scraps of trash that had missed the garbage truck. “Do you wanna try X-raying it first?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I do, actually,” Conner says, and Tim stands patiently while Conner does the disconcerting thing where his pupils expand and contract rapidly for a few seconds as he focuses in; Tim is glad he can’t really see it in the dark. While he does that, Tim decides to explore a thought that’s been niggling at him since Conner had told him the door was unlocked again, and heads for the back door of the doctor’s building. Crouching, he pulls his phone out, uses the flashlight to illuminate the door handle.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s a regular, round knob on a wooden door; a small-town doctor’s office likely doesn’t feel that it has much to protect besides patient records, which will be safely locked away inside. They should be right about that, too, except Tim can see scratch marks around and across the keyhole, as if someone in a hurry had tried to pick the lock of this particular doctor’s office. A very bad feeling begins to collect at the base of Tim’s skull, but he’s pulled away by a loud crunching noise in the side alley, and he springs back towards Conner with his heart in his throat.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When he rounds the corner, Conner is grinning sheepishly at him. “Sorry,” Conner whispers, and Tim realizes what the noise must have been; Conner is holding the dumpster up off the ground with one hand, and a few of the bricks near the roof of the building are cracked. He gives Conner a flat look, but forgets his irritation when he glances at the ground underneath the dumpster.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Are those…?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Looks like it to me,” Conner says, and Tim moves in, hooks the edge of his shirt over his fingers to pick up the tangle of beads and chains that Conner’s found.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“So, nothing stolen this time, either. They break in, grab the necklaces, escape out the back door, and then… abandon the jewelry in a hurry. Don’t even take time to actually open the lid of the dumpster, which might have let them dispose of the necklaces without getting caught, if the relatively inexperienced police hadn’t thought to search the trash.”<br/><br/>“So, where does that leave us, detective?” Conner asks, lowering the dumpster back into place with extreme caution. Tim bends over to drop the necklaces again, nudging them underneath until only a corner of the tangled mess peeks out from under the edge. If the police don’t find them, maybe an employee will.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I… still have no idea,” Tim says, although he’s starting to have an uncomfortable suspicion that these break-ins could be connected to Conner somehow. It could be a total coincidence, he assures himself; after all, he can’t even say for sure that anyone actually broke into the doctor’s office, and it’s a small enough town that it’s sort of hard for any break-in <em>not</em> to be near the school in some capacity. For now, he’s going to keep his worries to himself—there’s no point in upsetting Conner even more, making him feel worse when he’s already obviously struggling to cope with the guilt of the Simon revelation.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I think that’s all we’re going to find here,” Tim tells Conner, heading around the back of the building in the opposite direction of the doctor’s office. “We should head back.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They head up a few buildings before Conner pauses to check with his X-ray vision that no one is close enough to see them, clearing them to trot across the street. Conner wraps an arm around Tim without hesitating this time, holding tight as he kicks off the ground, and Tim doesn’t overreact, because he’s an adult who can handle things like casual physical contact with his best friend. They make it back to the farm without incident, and as Conner gets ready for bed, Tim pulls his phone back out and types up a text to Babs, and then one to Bruce, for good measure. He snorts when he gets a frowny face emoticon back.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You good?” Conner asks as he comes back from the bathroom and makes a beeline for his bed. Tim glances back over his shoulder as he shuts his phone off, tries to make his smile look natural.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, I’m fine. Goodnight, Conner.”</p>
<p><br/><br/>“G’night, Tim.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Okay, so I did absolutely give Tim my hobby because he deserves to RELAX (even though I rarely find crochet relaxing?? I hear other people do lol?) but re: Jason and Kon. Listen. Jason would absolutely pick up a hobby that gave him constant, innocuous access to stabbing implements, who are we kidding, and Kon probably just picked it up because he wanted to spend time with Ma :P</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Tim gets a haircut, and things go terribly awry.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>HI EVERYONE I made it in time for my usual posting schedule this week!! Fair warning, updates may continue taking a little longer than before because a) school, b) work, c) mild, off-and-on pandemic depression lol, but I will do my best to keep on track with this fic!! You all were SO GODDAMN SWEET these past couple of weeks and it truly made me feel so supported and warm and fuzzy that so many people took the time to stop and wish me well, I love every single one of you and I screenshotted all of the comments because they were just so nice I wanna keep em forever?? Still haven't even deleted the fake chapter because it gives me Emotions how nice yall are :')</p><p> </p><p>Anyway, this chapter is a little shorter than what I've been aiming for lately and unedited as usual but uh. I feel like I really crammed the emotional drama in lmao, so hopefully that makes up for it? Like just when you thought surely I couldn't shove another schmoopy cliche into this fucker?? And yet. I thrive. Enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It takes a few days before Tim gets a call from Babs; she's a very busy lady, and he's asked her to do something extremely annoying for no apparent reason, so he can’t really hold it against her.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright,” she says when he picks up, sounding irritated, “I can't believe Bruce really shipped you out there with <em>nothing</em>. He owes me for forcing me to relay this information verbally instead of just emailing it to you like a human being.”</p><p> </p><p>“I know,” Tim says, heading out of the house to get some privacy. He ends up hanging over the side of the chicken pen, dangling his fingers to stroke soft feathers as a few of the bolder hens approach. “It's… very different. Not always convenient.”</p><p> </p><p>“You don’t sound as miserable as I would have thought. Are you, Tim Drake-Wayne, life-long city boy, night owl extraordinaire, <em>enjoying</em> the farm?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shrugs, belatedly remembering that she can’t see the gesture. “It’s pretty nice, honestly. Definitely out of my comfort zone, and I'm going to be <em>so</em> rusty when I get back, but I do like it. It's peaceful.”</p><p> </p><p>“Huh,” Babs says, and Tim can't tell what her tone means. “Well, anyway, I've been looking into what you were asking about, but I haven’t found a lot. As far as this Valentine kid, there's an article in the Smallville Ledger about him around once a year, alternately reporting that he won the science fair or blew something up at the science fair. He spends a lot of time on forums under various usernames, mostly a mix of theoretical science and conspiracy theory boards; cryptids, psychics, government cover-ups, that kind of thing. He’s subscribed to an RSS feed for Superboy sightings, but not much else superhero-related. He's a weirdo for sure, <em>very</em> into some pretty specific stuff, but none of his posts strike me as violent or dangerous.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim holds back the sigh of relief. At least Simon hasn't become openly hostile yet, which means they might have time to head off the Prime Hunter problem before Simon gets any ideas.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks for checking in on that, Babs. Anything with LexCorp?”</p><p> </p><p>“Mm, sort of. There's some information out in the open channels about what Valentine is working on, test results, reports, emails with his supervisors, that kind of thing. It's all pretty innocent, if you count any version of mind control tech as innocent. Seems like they're mostly testing on rats; they're more interested in the idea of experimenting with mammals than amphibians, although Valentine seems pretty attached to the whole frog thing, if that makes you feel any better.”</p><p> </p><p>“It makes me feel better about Simon, but not about LexCorp. I don’t like the idea of them messing with mind-control at all, and testing it on rats is one step closer to human testing.” It leaves a bitter taste at the back of his throat, apprehension about what Lex <em>actually </em>wants this for. No doubt that he’ll find some perfectly innocent cover story if the public catches on, but it's not hard to imagine all of the awful things he could do with that kind of technology if he and Simon succeed. Tim’s arm aches.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s not a good sign,” Babs agrees. “I couldn’t find much about it below the surface, either. Usually no news is good news, but there are parts of their servers locked down so tight it'll take me days to dig my way into them, and I have other cases to work on. I can't guarantee you that nothing worse is going on without full access, so my best advice is to stay on your toes until I can get you more info. Unfortunately, it looks like Simon's research is going pretty well.”</p><p> </p><p>“Great,” Tim says, sighing heavily. One of the chickens nips his finger and he jerks his hand back, glaring at the offending hen. “Rude,” he mutters.</p><p> </p><p>“What?”</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, nothing. Thanks for looking into it, Babs.”</p><p> </p><p>“No problem. I’ll keep working on it, but don’t expect anything soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right.” She fills him in briefly on how the rest of the family is doing, and it’s sort of reassuring to hear that things seem to have settled down in his absence. Quiet patrols, but not eerily quiet, no obvious signs of something worse gathering on the horizon. Steph got punched in the face and lost a tooth, but is putting off seeing a dentist because she can use the bloody gap to gross Dick out. Jason found a stray puppy and is refusing to surrender it into Damian’s custody, resulting in headache-inducing shouting matches at the manor. Everything blessedly normal, and despite all the problems that seem to be cropping up in Smallville, it does make Tim feel better to know that his family is as safe as they ever get. Kind of makes him wonder if the trouble has just been following <em>him</em>.</p><p> </p><p>Hanging up with Babs, he heads back inside. Conner is back from school and nearly finished his homework—Tim slides back into the seat across from him, and Conner glances up, smiling.</p><p> </p><p>“Everything good?” Tim always wonders how Conner manages to tune out nearby conversations, but he's seen the way Conner reacts to bad news, and he doesn’t think Conner would be able to cover it up if he'd been eavesdropping. He trusts Conner, of course, doesn’t think he would invade anyone's privacy on purpose, but either his focus is truly impressive, or Conner had been sitting in here with his fingers stuffed in his ears. The mental image makes Tim smile back.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, sounds like the manor hasn't collapsed around Bruce's ears yet. Not for anyone’s lack of trying, of course.”</p><p> </p><p>“I figure with as many kids as he has, Wayne Manor is probably kind of like the human body, where it's just constantly replacing parts of itself.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, well. That's a creepy mental image, but I guess you're not… entirely wrong?” Tim wrinkles his nose as he considers the concept, and Conner laughs at him.  The whole thing is comfortable, peaceful, and Tim tries to set aside the worry that won’t stop niggling at the back of his mind. There's truly nothing he can do here, short of flying back to Gotham and breaking his cowl back out—he’s already utilizing all of his available resources to minimize the potential threats. This isn’t Gotham, where he's well-equipped and trouble is always raring to be found, lurking in any dark corner where you care to look. It doesn’t feel right, but for lack of anything better to do, he's forced to wait, helpless. Maybe this is what most people think of as relaxing.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>In the eerie silence that descends over Smallville (really, is this what peace and quiet is like? Tim's not sure he likes it), Tim lets Conner make him do normal things. Mostly.</p><p> </p><p>They go into town and Kon buys Tim a Smallville hoodie despite the fact that it’s the middle of June. Tim’s biggest question is who in town is bothering to <em>produce</em> Smallville hoodies, since Smallville doesn’t exactly boast a booming tourism industry, but he decides to let it go. If Conner wants him to have a Smallville hoodie, he’ll take the Smallville hoodie.</p><p> </p><p>They head to the tiny Smallville museum after Conner gets back from school one day so that Conner can complete an assignment for his U.S. history class. On a Saturday, they spend the better part of the day wandering around one of Smallville’s antique stores (Smallville has a lot of antique stores, Tim notes), both of them quietly baffled by the variety of objects they find, laughing at the juxtaposition of elegant glassware with vintage clown posters.</p><p> </p><p>The next day, Conner and Krypto take Tim to one of the clear, trickling creeks that branches off Bruin Lake for an afternoon. Tim appreciates Conner’s effort to entertain him, get him out of the Kent house for a while, but he spends most of that little adventure trying not to die of sheer mortification as Conner politely helps him over fallen tree trunks and catches frogs to show him. Still, he somehow manages to hold it together right up until Krypto tries to eat one of the frogs, at which point they reach a silent, mutual agreement to move on to cool rocks. All of the natural beauty and quiet is a little easier to appreciate after that—it’s harder for Conner to get that delighted, affectionate look on his face over a rock than an animal.</p><p> </p><p>They also hang out with Conner’s friends more than once, which is… difficult. Keeping a handle on his crush, which isn’t going away despite Tim’s constant effort to remind himself that Conner isn’t interested and he’s getting his hopes up for nothing, is easier when they aren’t trying to maintain a cover that inherently requires close contact. Tim will be doing fine, just sitting on the water tower in the golden evening sun, enjoying the breeze. Encouraging Lori as she complains about small town life, fighting to keep a straight face as Sujan earnestly describes his attempts to learn how to cook, grinning as he watches Conner race over a field in pursuit of Krypto. And then Conner will touch down, breathless and laughing as Krypto rolls over to wiggle at Lori’s feet, and sling an arm around Tim’s shoulders, pulling him close. Tim will smile, winding an arm around Conner’s waist, and feel like he wants to shrivel away into nothing.</p><p> </p><p><em>Wanting</em> something is workable; Tim has always wanted plenty of things, always been a little greedy in his heart, but it’s usually easy enough to tuck those feelings away and focus on business, doing what’s right. The torturous part is when the thing that he wants <em>is</em> business, when doing what’s right means getting so close to what he wants that it makes his throat burn and his palms itch knowing that he’ll still never have it.</p><p> </p><p>It’s precisely this feeling that he’s trying to shake off late one night, sitting on the floor of Conner’s room and staring morosely at a kitten picture on his phone, courtesy of Cassie, when he notices a red glow coming from the bathroom across the hall. At this point in his life Tim doesn’t trust <em>any</em> glowing light, and particularly not one that shows up abruptly at quarter of one in the morning in Kansas, so it's enough to get him on his feet to investigate. Padding silently towards the bathroom, he pokes his head around the half-closed door. Heat washes over his face, and he squints against the onslaught.</p><p> </p><p>What he sees in the bathroom is Conner, shirtless, hunched over in front of the mirror with some sort of… metal contraption around his head. It's a weird, leggy thing he's holding in one hand, with jagged sheets of metal attached to each other by way of a series of thin, jointed rods. As Tim watches, the thing seems to move on its own, making some minute adjustment to the angle of the metal sheets. Conner's eyes begin to glow red, and Tim feels himself starting to panic, dread heavy in his gut as he wonders what fresh hell this is, what alien nightmare has somehow found Conner in his own <em>home</em>. Then a thin bolt of heat vision flashes, and a half second later a short clump of hair falls off the back of Conner’s head. Tim's jaw drops.</p><p> </p><p>“Is this how you <em>cut your hair</em>?” Tim demands, and Conner jumps, jostling the makeshift mirrors out of place.</p><p> </p><p>“Shit,” he hisses, and the bits of metal realign themselves, Conner checking the angles carefully before glancing over at Tim. “Um, yes?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim can't help it—he bursts out laughing. “Wow,” he gasps after a minute. Conner gives him an injured look. “I never thought about how hard that would be when you're invulnerable. I feel so bad for your whole family?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, Ma tells me she broke a lot of pairs of scissors as Clark's powers started coming in,” Conner says, expression easing into a rueful grin. “There’s a year-long gap in the family album where there are no photos of Clark. He finally hit full invulnerability and got so embarrassed about his hair that he refused to let anyone take his picture until they figured this out.” Conner nods at the strange device in his hand.</p><p> </p><p>“Right, what is that?” Tim asks, stepping further into the bathroom. Even the floor tiles are warm with the residual heat of Conner's powers.</p><p> </p><p>“Pieces of the ship Clark came here in.” Conner holds the thing out and Tim reaches to touch it, brushing his fingertips over the smooth, slightly warm metal. He's a little awed despite himself—he’s touching a piece of Superman's past, and if he thinks about it too long, he starts to get a little emotional. The feeling takes him by surprise, but this metal that Conner is using so casually to keep his spit curl from growing out is also the only reason he <em>exists</em>, that Tim ever got the chance to know him.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s strong enough to reflect your heat vision?” Tim asks, distracting himself from that line of thought, the hot feeling at the back of his throat.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, it’s pretty sturdy stuff,” Conner says. The metal moves again, and Tim squints.</p><p> </p><p>“And you’re doing that with your TTK? It doesn’t move on its own, does it?”</p><p> </p><p>“Nah, that’s me,” Conner says, puts the thing down on the counter to demonstrate how it lies limply. “I’m just gonna finish up here—it takes a while, but I’m almost done. Want me to do you next?” He grins, reaches out to tug a lock of hair beside Tim’s ear. Batting his hand away, Tim turns to examine himself in the mirror. He pulls a strand of hair away from his head, observing. It nearly brushes his shoulders in the back, and it’s creeping dangerously towards his chin in front.</p><p> </p><p>“It <em>is</em> getting pretty long… maybe I should….” Trailing off, he drifts back out of the bathroom. Conner says nothing, watching him silently with an eyebrow cocked as Tim turns away, but as Tim moves back into Conner’s room, he sees another flash of red in the corner of his eye. Going to Conner’s desk, he rifles through the top drawer, where Conner keeps his school supplies in a haphazard pile. After digging for a minute, he finds what he’s looking for and sticks his head back into the bathroom.</p><p> </p><p>“Do you mind if I borrow these?” Conner looks up from where he’s zapping the back of his hairline, one last strand falling to the floor and leaving him with an even line across the base of his skull. Tim is sort of impressed, honestly. When he notices what Tim is holding, Conner’s eyes go wide and he shakes his head frantically, stepping towards Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, no,” Conner says, reaching out to tug the scissors out of his hand. “You seem kind of out of it, and I don’t think you should be cutting your own hair even when you’re at the top of your game.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim frowns at him, crosses his arms over his chest. “You don’t believe in me,” he says, accusing. Conner’s eyebrows go up, and he gets that look that Tim knows means he’s trying not to smile.</p><p> </p><p>“I believe in you a hundred percent, Rob. I believe in you so much that I <em>believe</em> you’re going to regret this in the morning when you wake up looking like Friar Tuck.”</p><p> </p><p>“Give me the scissors,” Tim says, frowning more deeply and sticking a hand out. Conner shakes his head.</p><p> </p><p>“Nuh-uh. I’m serious, if you want a haircut, I’m way better equipped for it than you.” The look Tim gives him is deeply skeptical, and Conner gestures at his own head. “Hello, just did my own? With heat vision and like six mirrors? Yours should be well within my capabilities. Also, between the two of us, I’m the only one who can actually see the back of your head.”  </p><p> </p><p>“You think you can do it? Really? It’s not as straightforward as yours.”</p><p> </p><p>“Tim, your ‘hairstyle’,” Conner says, making the air quotes with his fingers and sounding exasperated, “is ‘six months since my last hair cut’. I think I can handle that. If I mess it up, I’ll pay Charlie to fix it for you, alright? But if either one of us is getting near your head with scissors, it’s me.”</p><p> </p><p>“I think I should be allowed near my own head with scissors,” Tim says, but he can hear the defeat in his own voice, and the look Conner gives him clearly indicates disagreement. He is sort of curious, really, if Conner will be able to actually do anything with it or if this experiment is going to go horribly, horribly wrong. He has enough money to buy a pretty convincing wig if he needs it, he supposes. And Conner is fast enough to get him to the manor in time for Alfred to sew his ear back on. It’ll be fine.</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t have one of those barber’s cape things. You want one of my shirts to keep the hair off?” Tim kind of wants to roll his eyes, but the other alternative would probably be opting to take his own shirt off. The idea of being shirtless with an equally half-naked Conner in a room that’s approximately six feet by eight feet, including the bathtub, toilet, and sink, is more than his stressed-out brain can handle right now.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” he says, because Conner is standing there waiting for an answer. Conner sort of looks at him sideways again, but goes out to retrieve the shirt without comment. He takes the scissors with him, Tim notes.</p><p> </p><p>He comes back quickly, handing Tim one of his S-shield t-shirts and dragging the chair from his desk behind him. Tim rolls his eyes as he takes the shirt, but it’s good natured. It’s not so unfamiliar, after all. When he was younger, he had a Superboy t-shirt of his own, along with a shirt each for Wondergirl and Impulse. He’d bought them off the internet, mostly as a joke, but in all the shuffle of moving and traveling, forever packing and unpacking, they had disappeared somewhere along the line. Tim wonders if he should buy new ones.</p><p> </p><p>Still, pulling Conner’s shirt on over his own is an experience entirely unlike wearing the knockoff Superboy tee he used to have. It’s huge, for one thing—Tim is certainly bigger than he used to be, taller and compactly muscular compared to his lanky teen build, but Conner’s sheer bulk will always dwarf him. The shirt’s hem falls to the lower end of the mid-thigh spectrum, sleeves draping past his elbows thanks to Conner’s stupid, broad shoulders, and hangs off him in a way that resembles a sack more than any sort of human clothing. Conner snorts and pulls out his phone.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry, the YJ group chat is getting this picture,” he tells Tim, who sighs heavily but makes no attempt to argue. He’s busy trying not to have an entirely inappropriate reaction to the smell of Conner’s shirt; laundry detergent, mostly, with a deeply ingrained trace of clean hay and something warm that Tim can’t put his finger on. It drifts up in waves, just infrequent enough that Tim notices it every single time rather than getting used to it. In that moment, he gives up entirely on his life not being a series of humiliating moments of weakness in which some vengeful deity tries to trick him into spilling the secret about his terrible, terrible crush. He knows what’s happening here—he can take a hint. Mostly he’s sort of morbidly curious about which cosmic entity he managed to piss off.</p><p> </p><p>Once Conner has his picture and is thumbing away at his phone, gleefully engineering the demise of any reputation Tim might have had left, Tim lets himself collapse into the desk chair that Conner placed in the center of the bathroom floor. He really is tired, and the late hour has less to do with it than the constant stress of maintaining his self-control and trying to maximize his extremely limited resources to fend off multiple, vague threats that could probably manifest as something awful at any moment. It reminds him of playing video games when he was younger, like losing all his armor and weapons right before a boss fight. He doesn’t like the feeling at all.</p><p> </p><p>Conner turns back to him and picks up a strand of his hair, cocking his head thoughtfully. “So, how short do you want it?”</p><p> </p><p>Good question. “Um,” Tim says helpfully. He hasn’t really thought about it in a long time, having given up on maintaining it shortly after Bruce disappeared. Since then, he’s mostly just let whatever stylist has been in charge of him during public appearances snip it back into something more acceptable before going back to ignoring it entirely. He barely remembers what it’s like to have an opinion about how his hair is styled, although he knows it used to be important to him. “Maybe just cut it back an inch or so? You can always make it shorter.”</p><p> </p><p>The look Conner gives him in the mirror is a strange mixture of exasperation and affection, but Conner picks up a section by his ear and gets started without further ribbing. The sound of the scissors shearing through strands and the sensation of Conner’s fingers combing through his hair as he picks up each section is… soothing. Between that and the residual warmth of the bathroom, intensified by the extra layer of Conner’s shirt, it’s not long before Tim is struggling to keep his eyes open, shoulders slumping.</p><p> </p><p>“You can relax,” Conner says, and there’s amusement in his voice. Tim wants to make some sort of snarky comeback, pick their banter from earlier back up, but all that comes out is a sighing little hum. Conner chuckles at that, runs his fingers through Tim’s hair in a way that has nothing to do with the haircut. “Just try not to actually pass out on me, okay? I don’t need you falling out of the chair while I’m holding scissors.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim thinks he might say something in response, but he’s a little lost, eyelids drifting fully closed. Despite giving Conner a hard time, Tim trusts him, and it’s not that important how his hair ends up looking. If someone teases him about it, he has every intention of throwing Conner under the bus, and… it’s kind of nice, just letting Conner take care of him. Not holding himself carefully, shying away. He doesn’t think it’s too terrible to let himself enjoy the feeling of Conner working steadily through his hair, knuckles brushing the back of his neck, fingers dragging across his scalp.</p><p> </p><p>He’s not sure how long it is before he hears Conner put the scissors down, still carding his fingers gently through Tim’s hair, brushing the newly cut strands off onto Tim’s shirt and the floor. “Alright,” Conner says, voice soft like he doesn’t want to disturb Tim. “How’s that?”</p><p> </p><p>Blinking, Tim comes back to himself a little, sighing and standing up to peer at himself in the mirror. He really does feel like he might have been asleep, except he’s pretty sure he remembers everything that happened. It’s an odd feeling, floaty, but he tries to pay attention, running his own hands through his hair and turning his head back and forth. “The same, but shorter,” he says after a minute. “Good job.”</p><p> </p><p>“Told you I could handle it,” Conner says, teasing. The grin playing across his face is entirely genuine, though, and Tim can’t help laughing.</p><p> </p><p>“Proving me wrong yet again. You’re still full of surprises, aren’t you?”</p><p> </p><p>“Always,” Conner says, reaching out to ruffle Tim’s hair. Tim lets him have it for once, sighing.</p><p> </p><p>“You know you’re only messing up your own handiwork, right?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, worth it. Go to bed, I’m gonna clean this up.” Tim figures maybe he should argue, not let Conner start to get any ideas about ordering him around, but if he’s honest with himself, he doesn’t really want to. He sleeps pretty well that night.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>“Dude, come on.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m serious, there is <em>no way—</em>”</p><p> </p><p>“Tim, man, come on. Just admit that in getting all cool and broody, you gave up your Mario Kart skills. Traded ‘em in for what, like, twenty yards of leather and an extra utility belt? We all make choices, bud, it’s okay—”</p><p> </p><p>“You are <em>cheating</em>, do you think I can’t <em>tell</em> when you’re using your superspeed?”</p><p> </p><p>“I am <em>not…</em>” Conner trails off, going very still in the middle of grabbing Tim to pull him into a headlock. Frowning, Tim shrugs Conner’s arm off his shoulders and sits up straight.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner?”</p><p> </p><p>“Breaking glass,” Conner mutters, eyes narrowing. “Yeah, knocking shit over…. Tim, I think there’s another break-in happening.” Tim’s eyebrows shoot up, and he pushes himself to his feet so fast he almost yanks his controller out of the GameCube.</p><p> </p><p>“Where? Come on, hurry up! We’ll miss them, get your nerd clothes on,” Tim says, reaching down to snag Conner’s arm and haul him to his feet. Conner looks sort of offended.</p><p> </p><p>“My <em>nerd clothes</em>?” He sounds wounded, but Tim rolls his eyes, shoving him towards the stairs.</p><p> </p><p>“You know what I mean, your—your school outfit!”</p><p> </p><p>“Why do I need to change clothes for this? Pretty sure this is a job for Superboy, not Conner Kent.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, sure it is. But if Conner Kent's not there, why am I?” Tim asks him, and Conner stares at him for a second, sighs, and twitches. Or it looks that way to Tim, at least, but he’s suddenly wearing his flannel and glasses, hair flattened against his forehead, and a gust of wind forces Tim to blink. Conner slows back down mid-stride and doesn’t stop walking as he grabs Tim, scooping him up with less decorum than usual and launching himself out the door as soon as he gets it open.</p><p> </p><p>The flight into town is so fast it’s jarring, almost makes Tim nauseous, although he can feel Conner’s TTK wrapped around him to protect him from the neck-snapping hazards of accelerating and decelerating so quickly. Tim doesn’t know where they are when they touch down, but even his human hearing can pick up noise in the distance, a crash that trails off into silence. Conner leads Tim in the direction of the noise at a quick trot, head swiveling back and forth like an antenna, presumably monitoring the sounds in the area. Tim is happy to let him take the lead, follows Conner silently back through a series of neatly kept, unintimidating alleyways that seem to be a different species than the ones in Gotham.</p><p> </p><p>The noise is getting louder—the burglars they’re dealing with seem to take a particular delight in causing plenty of property damage before they make a break for it, and this time isn’t an exception. Conner leads him up an alley that’s closed off at the end by a chain link fence. When Conner grabs Tim and deposits them on the other side, Tim realizes they’ve ended up behind a building that he thinks he recognizes as Smallville’s courthouse. The potential implications of that aren’t comforting, but Tim doesn’t have much time to think about it.</p><p> </p><p>As they step forward into the T-shaped intersection of alleys in front of the fence, a blurring shape bounces off the corner of one of the buildings in front of them and makes a wild leap overhead, landing in the shadows somewhere to their left. Turning on his heel, Tim moves to take off in pursuit, civilian disguise be damned. Someone is <em>definitely</em> sticking their nose where it doesn’t belong, and Tim wants to know why.</p><p> </p><p>He makes it about a half step, catches sight of a light flashing down the alley in front of him before something snags his wrist and hauls him backwards, slamming him into the brick wall opposite the courthouse. The impact is surprising but for some reason doesn't hurt nearly as much as Tim knows it should, and then there are hands on his face—big, warm hands that curl intimately around his jaw as Conner kisses him.</p><p> </p><p>Tim only knows that’s what’s happening because his eyes are wide open and he can see the familiar line of concentration between Conner’s eyebrows as his lips move against Tim’s, his body pressing overwhelmingly close in the dark. Tim feels himself shudder, painfully honest, and can’t stop the way he starts to kiss back against his better judgment, hands sliding over Conner’s waist and up the soft flannel that stretches across his broad back. Tim feels small in a way he rarely does, boxed in against the wall with one of Conner’s hands still cupping the side of his face as the other starts to slide up into his hair, and something about it makes him <em>want</em>, his whole body hot, blood surging molten in his veins. Conner pulls back just a little, their lips still brushing, and Tim has just enough time to gasp before Conner’s mouth is back on his, parted lips catching against each other, matching each other so perfectly it makes Tim’s chest ache.</p><p> </p><p>He’s not sure when he closed his eyes, but they snap open again as bright white light spills down the alleyway, cuts across his face.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, now!” A man in a blue uniform stands at the mouth of the alley, frowning at them as he points his flashlight in their direction. Conner jerks away from Tim like he’s genuinely startled, and Tim feels loss open up in the pit of his stomach as he realizes what must have happened, feels cold and empty in places that Conner never even touched him.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner Kent? Is that you, son? What are you doing out so late? And didn’t you hear that racket?”</p><p> </p><p>“Um,” Conner says, shifting just a little in front of Tim as if to shield him from the police officer’s gaze. Pushing his glasses up his nose, he shrugs, awkward and earnest. “I—I guess not? I was, um. Sort of distracted.” The officer moves his flashlight past Conner’s shoulder just enough to illuminate Tim’s face, and Tim closes his eyes again.</p><p> </p><p>“I see,” the police officer says, sounding a little too amused. “Well, it’s past time for you to get home. Don’t worry your Ma, eh? There’s been some trouble tonight, so you boys head back to the farm and stay safe.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right, we will. Thanks, Mr. Daniels.” The man nods and moves off, headed for the front of the building Tim is still leaning against. He’s not sure his legs work right now, so he thinks it’s probably just safest to stay here for a while with the brick solid against his back, catching on the fabric of his t-shirt. Whoever they had seen earlier is sure to be long gone by now, anyway. After a very long minute, Conner turns back from the mouth of the alley. Tim sees out of the corner of his eye the way Conner isn’t quite looking at him and feels nauseous, his roiling stomach a vicious contrast to rest of his body, still frozen in place where Conner had pressed him up against the wall.</p><p> </p><p>“Um. Sorry.”</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>WELP. Some action finally, lol??</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>In which there are fireworks.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Yall I am past my bedtime as I finish this chapter lol, I'm so sorry if it's, uh. less coherent than usual?? I had fun writing it tho!! Also fair warning, this may be the last truly peaceful chapter for a while? I think I know where I wanna take this fic and it might get kind of wild haha. Anyway, thanks so much for all your patience as my production speed has slowed down a bit, enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They don’t talk on the way back.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>It’s not a cruel silence, not exactly. Not on purpose. Neither of them is angry, but Tim can see guilt in the slumped line of Conner’s shoulders, fear in the way he won’t quite look at Tim, and it’s probably worse than if they were shouting at each other. God knows what Tim’s own body language is projecting. The fact that Conner has that look on his face, like he’s taken advantage of Tim somehow, like he’s waiting for Tim to blow up at him, just intensifies the nausea that Tim is still feeling. Right now, it’s all too overwhelming to even begin breaking down his emotions into coherent descriptions, anything as neat and easy as words.</p><p> </p><p>When they get back to the farmhouse, Conner puts him down in the shadow of the porch, and he’s never snatched his hands away from Tim as quickly as he does now, barely taking the time to steady Tim on his feet before backing up. Every inch of space he puts between them feels like a knife in Tim’s throat, and Tim lets it seem like it’s the rough landing that forces him to catch himself against the porch railing.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” Conner whispers again. Tim’s not sure exactly what he’s apologizing for, but he wants him to stop so badly that it’s a struggle not to scream.</p><p> </p><p>“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Tim says, knows it comes out hoarse and flat. Conner backs up another step, far enough that a stripe of light from the porch lamp catches him, slants across his face. Tim can tell from the harsh angles of his eyebrows, the tension at the bridge of his nose and the corners of his eyes, how upset he must be, expression crumpled in a way Tim’s not sure he’s ever seen before. “It was—you did what you had to.”</p><p> </p><p>If anything, Conner looks <em>worse</em> after he says that, and Tim doesn’t know how to stop ruining this. It should have been nothing—they’ve all had to do some pretty weird shit in the name of maintaining a cover, after all. And he and Conner are best friends, aren’t they? It should have been easy to laugh off, joking about their shit timing and the goddamned cops, how won’t Steph be mad she missed <em>that</em>? But Tim can’t stop overreacting, can’t stop getting in his own way, and it’s the most hideous sort of irony that Tim feeling like he would give anything for Conner to stop <em>looking</em> at him like that is the reason things are so fucked up in the first place.   </p><p> </p><p>“Let’s just—” he says, and takes a sideways step towards the little set of stairs leading up the porch. He catches Conner’s jerky nod, and then neither of them really look at each other, making their way up and inside, heading for Conner’s room.</p><p> </p><p>The space feels suffocatingly small now where it had been cozy before, and the structure of the nightly routine they’ve established, changing into their pajamas, taking turns in the bathroom, is like sandpaper against Tim’s raw nerves. Conner has put up with a lot of Tim’s shit this trip—he’s been nothing but welcoming, generous, accepting, supporting Tim and finding ways to keep him entertained, help him unwind. In return, Tim is pretty sure he’s mostly succeeded in making Conner feel awkward and bad about his sexuality and their relationship. It’s kind of all of Tim’s worst fears about himself confirmed. Without the benefit of some all-consuming mission to drive him and give him a reason to lead, all he’s managed to do is put Conner on edge, make him feel like he has to tiptoe around the guy who’s supposedly his best friend.</p><p> </p><p>Tim cannot, at this point, fathom how he could be a <em>worse</em> friend—he knows he’s pushed this lie too close to the point of no return, that he needs to say something to Conner, get his feelings out in the open. At least that way Conner can look at the facts and decide for himself, rather than constantly feeling bad when <em>Tim</em> is the one lying. It’s not fair to let Conner blame himself for the way Tim has been acting.</p><p> </p><p> Just the idea of doing it is enough to put his system in shock, though, freezes his muscles and stops his breath. Something like that could be the end of their friendship as he’s known it—you can’t always just bounce back from such a drastic shift in the understanding between two people, the dynamic of a relationship. The weight of the confession might be enough to smother them, kill something that even death hadn’t. Not that Tim thinks Conner would react <em>badly</em>, but… things would be different, in a way neither of them could take back or change, and one of the most important relationships in Tim’s life would wind to a slow, painful close. Still, if he can do something to stop hurting Conner, doesn’t he owe him that? Isn’t Conner worth that much sacrifice?</p><p> </p><p>The thought is still terrifying no matter what Tim tries to tell himself about it being right and good, and dwelling on it for too long makes his muscles ache with tension and chest start to do a tight, hitchy little thing as he lays there in the dark, staring at Conner’s ceiling. Conner is unnaturally silent above him. He tends to sort of murmur and snuffle in his sleep, Tim has discovered over the course of the last few weeks, but right now there’s nothing, and he knows Conner is every bit as awake as Tim himself. Tim can’t just let him keep suffering, over… making Tim uncomfortable, pissing him off, whatever Conner thinks happened out there. He needs to know that this is Tim’s burden to bear.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner, I….” His voice comes out so quiet he can barely hear it in his own ears, but it’s the only way he can push it out past the tightness in his throat. Somehow, trying to force these words out of his mouth feels like standing on the edge of a hundred-story building without a grappling hook, adrenaline galloping through his veins. Normally, even that wouldn’t be so bad—ever since Conner’s been back, the knowledge has lived in some warm, quiet corner of his brain that Conner is always just a shout away, that even stepping off that ledge, he’d still be safe. “You—I need to….”</p><p> </p><p>There’s no response from the bed, not even the rustling of sheets as Conner turns to face him, no acknowledgement at all that Tim has spoken. Tim has no safety net right now, and he falters in a way he’s never known himself to, that he’ll probably going to regret for the rest of his life. Silent and ashamed, he backs away from the edge.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim wakes up feeling like he hasn’t slept the next morning, so distracted and agitated that he doesn’t even realize what day it is until Conner comes back into his room a little after nine and lets the wafting smell of baked goods in with him. Tim blinks at him from where he’d crawled back under the blankets on the air mattress in a fit of self-pity, laying on his stomach and ripping miscounted stitches out of the scarf he’s been working on.</p><p> </p><p>“…Are you skipping school or something?” he asks, and when Conner laughs and shakes his head, it’s only a little strained. The tightness in Tim’s chest still doesn’t budge.</p><p> </p><p>“Man, it’s only been like a month. You already lost track of what day it is?”</p><p> </p><p>“Bold of you to assume I ever knew what day it was in the first place,” Tim says, raising an eyebrow at him. Conner snorts and crosses over to him, dropping down on the edge of the air mattress and reaching over to pick up Tim’s scarf, examining the stitches in lieu of looking Tim in the eye.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s the fourth of July, bud. No summer school. There’s gonna be a parade in a couple of hours, and then everybody in town gets together for a cookout and fireworks and everything.” Tim blinks at Conner, who’s still not really looking at him. It’s true, Tim hasn’t been paying attention at all to the fact that he’s been here for nearly a month. There’s been so much and so little going on all at once that time has started to go a little fuzzy around the edges, minutes passing like hours and weeks like days.</p><p> </p><p>“Right, I guess being allowed back into costume for Pride last weekend should have clued me in,” Tim mutters, shaking his head at himself. Conner exhales heavily and unsteadily in a way that’s not quite a laugh, one corner of his mouth quirking.</p><p> </p><p>“Possibly. You’re gonna come, right? To the parade and the fireworks, at least?” Sitting up, Tim props his elbow on a knee and his chin in his palm, looking at Conner. He’s not sure if it shows on his face how concerned he is, but it doesn’t really matter either way, since Conner <em>still</em> isn’t looking at him. He keeps staring down at his hands, worrying the edge of Tim’s scarf between his fingers, and his whole posture is so unsure that Tim wants to reach out and shake him, push his shoulders back and his chin up, anything to make him stop looking so <em>sorry</em>.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow, I have a choice, huh? I figured attendance would be mandatory for a big shindig like that.” A laugh bursts out of Conner in a huff, like he’s trying to hold it back, and he finally skirts a glance in Tim’s direction, their eyes meeting for just a second.</p><p> </p><p>“Did I just hear the word ‘shindig’ come out of your mouth? Who <em>are</em> you?” When he looks back down, there’s a grin shining through the uncertainty on his face, and it’s enough of a start for Tim. Scooting closer, he reaches out to nudge Conner with an elbow, ducks his head to shoot him a sideways grin of his own.</p><p> </p><p>“You heard me. C’mon, it’s not a law or something that anybody physically present within a fifteen-mile radius has to attend all community holiday events? I know how Smallville is now, all neighborly and nosy. They’d let me off the hook?” Finally, <em>finally</em>, Conner looks at him for real, sitting back on his hands and tipping his head to meet Tim’s eyes with good humor that’s only slightly restrained, nudges him back.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, sure. Nobody <em>has</em> to go if they don’t want to. You’ll just be dooming me to spending the entire day explaining where my young man is and why he didn’t come with me, and then <em>yourself</em> to probably a solid month of strangers asking you about your health every time we go into town because I lied and told them you weren’t feeling well.” Grimacing, Tim sighs and goes back to cradling his chin in his hand.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, alright, you got me. As funny as the thought of you trying to fend off questions about your boyfriend from a bunch of middle-aged women is, you know I don’t have that kind of patience.”  Conner mirrors his posture, grins again and finally looks relaxed enough that the knot of tension at the base of Tim’s skull starts to ease.</p><p> </p><p>“Who, you? You’re like, the most patient person I know. No idea what you’re talking about.” Tim shoves him remorselessly, sending Conner sprawling on his side with a laugh, and if there’s still something not quite the same as it was between them, it’s close enough that Tim can laugh along with him, rolling his eyes.</p><p> </p><p>“So, is the cookout thing the reason I smell baked goods?” Conner props himself back up and nods enthusiastically, his whole face lighting up.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, Ma’s been baking all morning. Apple, cherry, and blueberry pies. That cookout is gonna be the <em>best</em>.” The look on his face transforms into something dreamy, and Tim glances away, his smile irrepressible.</p><p> </p><p>“Crap. If you tell me that, I guess I really can’t inflict all of your well-meaning, busybody neighbors on you, can I? No way I’m missing Ma’s pie.”</p><p> </p><p>“I always knew you were smart,” Conner tells him, clapping Tim on the shoulder as he pushes to his feet. “I’m gonna go help Ma finish up and get everything packed. We’ll probably leave for the parade around eleven-thirty, okay? It starts kinda late because people basically just roll right into the cookout, and then the fireworks from there.”</p><p> </p><p>“Sure,” Tim says, smiling up at him. It sounds like an exhaustingly social day, but at this point, Tim is happy to suck it up through whatever social nightmares Smallville can throw at him if it makes things right between him and Conner. “I’ll be down in a few minutes.”</p><p> </p><p>“No rush,” Conner says as he pulls the door closed behind him. It’s almost as casual as it should be.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Ma truly has been baking up a storm—they leave nine pies, stacked in neat boxes in the fridge since the day is getting hot already, as they troop out the door to attend the parade, Ma in her sunhat and Conner with his ever-present button down over a t-shirt. He’s lucky he doesn’t overheat easily, Tim muses. Even Tim has begrudgingly pulled out the only pair of socially acceptable shorts he had packed, earning himself plenty of commentary from Conner about Tim hitting his head and needing to take pictures of this historic moment for the group chat and the world ending. Tim feels absolutely justified in tripping Conner to steal shotgun when they all pile in Ma’s truck to head into town.</p><p> </p><p> The parade is relatively short, making its way up the length of Main Street before turning and ending at the school, but noisy and enthusiastic. The high school’s marching band makes up for any nerves with sheer volume, and several local dance and cheer teams dressed in red, white, and blue costumes are kicking and cartwheeling their hearts out. There are one or two decidedly homemade floats, and by the time the mayor drives through, seated high in a car decked out in streamers and wearing a red, white, and blue-striped stovepipe hat (of course they make those, Tim thinks, suppressing a laugh), the cheers are hoarse, but every bit as joyful as they were when the parade started.</p><p> </p><p>Thanks to the outflow of parade traffic, it takes about twenty minutes to get back to the house and get all of the pies loaded—Conner ends up sitting in the bed of the truck, holding them all steady with his hands and a touch of TTK. The trip back is almost as slow, but everyone is in such a good mood that it doesn’t really matter, Ma pausing at stop signs to chat with friends who are crossing the street, Conner waving at groups of students who shout cheerfully at him. Tim just lets himself enjoy it.</p><p> </p><p>The cookout is held at the athletic fields behind the high school, the only space in town big enough to hold everyone that isn’t already full of corn or wheat or soybeans. Tim and Conner unload the pies from the bed of the truck in the school parking lot, splitting the load of baked goods between them and letting Ma lead the way. Tim can already smell burgers and hot dogs cooking, and when they make it around the back of the school, there are tables and tables crammed so full of food that it’s a struggle to find space for Ma’s pies. Tim suspects that’s probably a form of sacrilege, but people are already working in teams to drag more tables out of storage.</p><p> </p><p>Once everything is set up, Tim finds himself unsure of what to do, glancing around the field. Large and small groups of people are scattered around as more file in around the side of the school building, and most already have plates piled with food, or are standing in line by the grills, chatting with the chefs of the day. Conner gets caught up in conversation with a woman Tim thinks might be one of his teachers, but once she wanders away, Conner seems to notice Tim just… standing there. Tim is immensely grateful when Conner smiles at him and tips his head towards the end of the long line still moving slowly along the tables. “You hungry?”</p><p> </p><p>Nodding, Tim follows Conner to the back of the line and does his best to make his peace with the fact that this is going to be a wildly awkward day, even though that feels a little unfair. After all, Tim does fine at Bruce’s galas when he has a head full of intel on every guest, just has to smile and make nice with old ladies and ask politely after their grandchildren. He’s been trained to manage smoothly in almost any role when he’s undercover, from high-end escort to passionate teacher's assistant to basement-dwelling internet troll. Even when he’s out in Gotham or San Francisco as Tim Drake, regular guy, he gets by with a minimum of social discomfort—he keeps up with the news, knows how to make the sort of harmless jokes that are appropriate with cashiers and baristas, and can banter with other customers in comic book shops without getting too overwrought about it.</p><p> </p><p>Here, though… it’s all friendly faces he doesn’t know, people who seem to expect a sort of familiarity that Tim doesn’t know how to give them. He smiles awkwardly and introduces himself over and over again, and then lets himself fade out as people turn to Conner, asking him about school and the farm and what he thinks of the weather this year. Even once he has a plate of food and a cup of lemonade to occupy him it doesn’t make him feel any more natural as Conner leads him around, hopping from picnic table to picnic table, having conversations with friends and acquaintances that are a little too insular for Tim to do anything but sit there and smile, chuckle along when he’s supposed to.</p><p> </p><p>“You okay?” Conner keeps asking him as they pass from group to group, and Tim smiles even harder, smiles until his face hurts. After last night, he <em>can’t</em> be the wet blanket on a day that Conner clearly enjoys. As much as he would love to go sit in the truck and close his eyes and let it be <em>silent</em> for even just a couple of minutes, he breathes through the feeling and nods at Conner, says, “I’m good,” every time Conner asks.</p><p> </p><p>“For real, you holding up okay? I know this isn’t really your thing,” Conner says during a lull in between conversations, when the two of them are just standing at the furthest edge of the fields in the shade of the scattered forest, Tim leaning back against a tree to give his feet a break. The picnic tables have been largely abandoned now that most people are finished eating, and Tim is a little jealous of Conner’s superhuman stamina after a couple of hours of standing around chatting. Even years of patrolling Gotham on a nightly basis hasn’t prepared his joints for this.  </p><p> </p><p>“I’m fine, Conner,” Tim assures him, craning his neck to meet Conner’s eyes. It’s true enough—Tim has survived much, much worse, and if he’s not exactly enjoying himself, it’s not the end of the world. “I just hope you know I’m not going to remember half of these people if I ever see them again. Please be prepared to greet them by name for me next time we talk to them.”</p><p> </p><p>That makes Conner laugh, and it almost makes up for the way Conner is still avoiding him just a little bit. Not enough to be overt, just… keeping his distance in a way he hadn’t before. Tim is only now realizing how used to it he’s gotten in the last few weeks, when he finds himself missing the tactile comfort of Conner’s fingers twining through his, longing for Conner’s arm around his shoulders or waist. He’s never thought of himself as a particularly affectionate person, particularly not one for PDA, but he’s finding that he feels sort of adrift without Conner anchoring him, lonely in a way he can’t account for when he’s still standing right next to his best friend.</p><p> </p><p>He’s perversely grateful when they wander over to sit down in the grass with Lori and Sujan and a few other friendly acquaintances from school and Lori shoots an odd look at the six inches of space Conner leaves in between them, her eyes flicking up to Tim’s with a frown. It’s the second or third time they’ve stopped to chat with her since they’ve been here, and she seems worried by the careful distance Conner has been maintaining. It gives Tim the excuse of their cover for the way he scoots closer to Conner, tucks himself into his side (why does he have to fit so <em>well</em> there? Everything would be easier if it were uncomfortable in the slightest), and slips his arm around Conner’s waist. Conner jumps, looks so startled that Tim has to make a point of shooting a blindingly sunny smile up at him and squeezing him tightly to get him to relax. When he looks back at the group, he catches Sujan’s sympathetic smile and tries not to let himself flush.</p><p> </p><p>It’s so much better, though, and for reasons he doesn’t fully understand, Tim can slip into the conversation a little more, the smiles not so forced when they’re like this. Conner slings an arm around his neck, and they sit and talk and laugh with the group for long enough that they end up tangled together, Tim’s head tucked under Conner’s chin, sprawled halfway across his lap, wrists linked around Conner’s bent knees to keep himself from falling completely into Conner.</p><p> </p><p>Everything is going just fine after that. They’re all having fun as the sunshine slips into the long, golden rays of afternoon, and one of Conner’s school friends engages him in a conversation about some new TV show that Tim doesn’t recognize. It’s fine, Tim listening with amusement for a few minutes before turning away towards the girl sitting next to them, a tanned brunette who re-introduces herself as Sal; Tim thinks he remembers her working at the diner where this whole mess had started. They chat idly about how her summer’s going and the traveling soccer team she’s on, and Tim is enjoying himself and everything is fine.</p><p> </p><p>It’s fine, at least, right up until the point that Conner needs to make some particularly impassioned point to the guy he’s talking to and sits up straight, reaching over to drag Tim casually into his lap like he doesn’t weigh a thing in order to free up his right arm for gesturing expansively as he talks over Tim’s head.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, come on, dude, there’s <em>no</em> <em>way</em> he’s gonna go all dark side on them. Have you <em>seen</em> the way they look at each other?” Conner is demanding when Tim tunes abruptly back into the conversation. Everything is still fine, really, except that Tim freezes and does <em>not</em> blush and Lori is <em>smirking</em> at him and even sweet Sujan is clearly fighting a smile, and Tim feels the back of his neck burning. Dammit.</p><p> </p><p>“Just wait,” the other guy is saying—Owen, maybe? Tim’s not entirely sure; the introductions for the big group had largely blurred by him, and his brain isn’t providing any useful feedback right now. “He’s gonna flip, and then they’ll have this whole arc about her mourning him and overcoming it emotionally and she’ll make some heroic sacrifice in the season finale, and it’ll be badass but also kind of sad because you know she never really got over him. And then <em>next </em>season it’ll be like oh, he was just a double agent after all, and it’ll be even more tragic.” He grins broadly, white teeth flashing against dark skin, and Conner sighs and mutters something into Tim’s hair that’s not quite a concession.</p><p> </p><p>As he slumps in defeat and his friend turns to a girl with neon pink hair to continue theorizing, Conner seems to realize what he’s done, chin dragging through Tim’s hair as he looks down and stills completely around Tim. It’s all Tim can do to suppress a sigh of his own, digging his elbow into Conner’s ribs hard enough that it would have hurt if he were a regular person, covering it with a stretch that, unfortunately, pushes his hips back into the cradle of Conner's thighs. As he settles down and tries to shake <em>that</em> sensation out of his brain, Tim reaches down and grabs Conner’s other arm, pulling it around his waist and settling back into Conner’s chest, carefully slumping to create space between their lower bodies. If they’re in a position this intimate, they can’t sit here looking like deer caught in the headlights the whole time, so Tim tips his head back against Conner’s shoulder, smiling up at him.</p><p> </p><p>“So, what show did you just get your ass handed to you about?” he asks, and his chest aches a little at how painfully <em>good</em> it all feels, sitting curled up so securely with Conner, joking around with him like always, knowing that this isn’t really his. Conner, at least, takes the hint and starts explaining to him, and after a minute Tim feels him shift his grip on Tim’s waist and relax a little. It’s for the best, Tim promises himself.</p><p> </p><p>There’s a second round of burgers and hot dogs being put on the grills, food that had been stowed in the school’s refrigerators being pulled out again when their group finally starts to break up, the sun dipping lower toward the horizon and painting the clouds with a pink tinge. Tim and Conner get in line for more food, and Tim looks around for the first time in a while, taking in the crowds around them. His eye catches on a nondescript man in a short-sleeved button down and khakis; Tim realizes that he’s seen that same guy standing around with his phone out an awful lot today, never talking to anyone. And that the man has been facing Tim and Conner pretty much every time Tim has spotted him, now that he stops to think about it. Tim narrows his eyes, memorizing the guy’s face as his eyes flick up to meet Tim’s and he turns away.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, so, um. Sorry about—what’s up?” Conner interrupts himself mid-sentence as he glances down and sees the look on Tim’s face, follows his eyes in the direction of the man disappearing into the crowd. Tim shakes his head, lips pursed.</p><p> </p><p>“Nothing. Just… that guy was giving me a weird vibe,” he says, shrugging but not looking away from the spot where he had been. After the courthouse break-in last night, he’s even more on edge about the idea of anyone skulking around Conner, especially if they have recording devices in their hands. It makes something swell furiously in his chest, his jaw clench, that someone might be trying to… <em>do</em> something to Conner, hurt him, blackmail him, whatever. He’s glancing around the crowd now, on edge, but shifts most of his attention back to Conner after a minute.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry, what were you saying?”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Conner says, shifting his weight between his feet and shoving his hands in his pockets. “I was just gonna, um. Apologize. For—well, for a couple of things.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim sighs, grabbing a paper plate and starting to shuffle through the line, loading up on food. He’s going to need the energy to get through the rest of this night. “Don’t, okay, Conner?” he says, and regrets it instantly when he catches the way Conner pauses halfway to scooping pasta salad onto his plate. It gets worse when Tim glances up at Conner, the expression on his face uncertain and almost <em>hurt</em>. Tim grimaces and shakes his head.</p><p> </p><p>“I didn’t mean that how it came out. Just—let’s get our food and talk about it where we have a little more privacy, okay?” He nudges Conner gently and smiles at him, tries to make it reassuring. He’s not sure if it works, but Conner nods, goes back to piling food on his plate. The quiet is somehow worse.</p><p> </p><p>This time as they drift away from the line, they head toward the back wall of the school, where there are a few scattered trees before the athletic fields really start. They sit down together under one as the sun is really starting to dip, everything turning dusky orange and purple. They eat in silence, and Tim starts to catch the flicker of the occasional firefly in the spaces between groups of people. It’s been ages since he’s seen fireflies, and it’s sort of magical. There’s a simple pleasure to watching them that keeps the anxiety at bay enough that Tim can shovel his food down, distracted from the conversation he’s about to have.</p><p> </p><p>Conner clears out their paper plates and cups when they’re done eating, and when he sits back down cross-legged next to Tim, he rubs the back of his neck the way he does when he’s embarrassed or thinking too hard. “Um….”</p><p> </p><p>The beat of silence borders on physically painful. “Okay, look,” Tim says when Conner doesn’t get anywhere. “I wasn’t bothered by you kissing me last night. We were gonna get caught somewhere we really didn’t belong, and you acted in the moment to minimize the consequences. It was completely fine, and I’m not upset or weirded out or whatever you’ve been worrying about.” Conner looks up at him, frowning.</p><p> </p><p>“…You seemed kinda bothered, man. I didn’t—I mean, I could have figured something else out. I should have thought about it more. I’m sorry, seriously.” He looks forlorn enough to make Tim’s temples begin to ache in warning, and he consciously unclenches his jaw. “I’ve been working on it, but I still sometimes just do stupid shit without stopping to think. I shouldn’t—it’s not right to put you in an awkward position because I leapt before I looked, you know? And then this afternoon, you know, I just wasn’t thinking, and I ended up putting you in kind of a weird position. Again.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim leans his elbows on his knees, runs his hands through his hair, tries to figure out what the hell he can say to let Conner off the hook without revealing himself as the kind of gross weirdo who runs around letting the guy he has a ridiculous crush on fake-kiss him without even <em>saying</em> anything. Scooting closer, Tim grabs the sides of Conner’s face, forces him to meet his eyes. Probably not his best idea, as he realizes too late that it’s <em>very</em> distracting how obnoxiously good Conner make those nerdy glasses look, but Tim gathers himself and focuses on what he needs to say to make this better.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner. Seriously. It doesn’t need to be a big deal. Much, much worse things have happened to me than being kissed without proper warning. I was surprised, not upset.” It feels a little bad to outright lie to Conner about that, but his upset had everything to do with his own ridiculous feelings and nothing to do with Conner’s actions, so he feels justified, mostly. It’s true enough that if it had been Steph or Bart or basically anyone else, it wouldn’t have phased him at all.</p><p> </p><p>“This afternoon… I don’t <em>love</em> being dragged around like a ragdoll, but that’s just my poor, abused dignity talking. Again, doesn’t even come close to ranking in my top one hundred list of ‘Worst Life Experiences’. I got cuddled by a friend, god forbid. Some people I know would probably even argue that that was pretty healthy for me,” Tim adds, self-deprecating smile curling his lips. Conner’s face had scrunched up, sadness in his eyes, when Tim brought up <em>worse things</em>, but he seems like he’s starting to relax now, a lopsided smile tugging faintly at one corner of his mouth. “You’re going to have to try <em>way</em> harder than this if you wanna scare me off, okay?”  </p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Conner says, shrugging a little. “I’ll still try to do better, though. I’m glad I didn’t upset you too much, but… I don’t really want you to have to measure our interactions against, like, the most traumatic things that have ever happened to you. Would rather be closer to the other end of the scale, you know?” It’s so genuine that Tim finds himself struggling not to do something deeply unwise, like rock forward and press his mouth against Conner’s. He’s not sure, honestly, that the kiss last night will ever be enough for him, that the urgent little voice bouncing around in the back of his skull will ever stop demanding <em>more</em>. Tim should really, really let go of Conner's face before the flawlessly smooth skin under his fingers becomes compromisingly distracting, but there's one more thing he needs to address first.</p><p> </p><p>“Also,” Tim says, frowning hard enough that Conner will know he's serious, “stop talking shit about yourself, okay? That’s my best friend, and I don’t appreciate it. Your plan worked out fine last night, and some version of this afternoon could have happened to anybody. If anything, I'm glad you're comfortable enough with me that you don’t have to stop to worry about this stuff before you do it. You can trust yourself, okay? You're not some thoughtless jerk.”</p><p> </p><p>He holds Conner's eyes and tries not to feel like a hypocrite and a creep. Fortunately, he has to focus on keeping his breathing under control when Conner’s eyes crinkle up at the corners with his smile, and then Conner is ruffling his hair and Tim doesn’t have to think about it anymore. Letting go of Conner, Tim sits back, kind of amazed that he managed to navigate that conversation without anything going horribly awry.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re too good at this stuff, you know that? Where’d you learn how to do this kind of thing? I know it wasn’t from the big guy,” Conner says, elbowing Tim gently. Laughing, Tim shrugs, looking back out at the fields. More people have joined them in sitting on the ground, setting out blankets and lawn chairs as the long day and the promise of fireworks pulls them to the earth.</p><p> </p><p>“I dunno. Dick, maybe? Diana? You?” Conner laughs out loud at that, and it’s starting to get dark enough that Tim struggles to catch the incredulous look Conner shoots him.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Me</em>? Seriously?” Tim raises an eyebrow, knowing Conner can see him just fine.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, you. I recall having some pretty supportive conversations with you, some of them quite recently.” Conner shrugs, but Tim can make out the curve of his smile in the dim glow of the sunset.</p><p> </p><p>It’s a little easier after that, but there’s still a line of tension lingering in Conner’s shoulders that Tim doesn’t like. Mulling his options over as they chat, Tim comes to the unfortunate conclusion that he’s probably going to have to make some sort of overt gesture to get Conner to accept that Tim really, truly isn’t uncomfortable. Acting like nothing major happened didn’t work. Leaning into their play-acting in public didn’t work. Even addressing the problem head-on, in the most straightforward and honest way that Tim is currently capable of managing, only seems to have partially mitigated the problem. He can’t let Conner stew about this kind of thing every time it happens all summer (Tim’s not kidding himself that this isn’t going to continue to be mind-numbingly awkward until he successfully kills his crush), so he braces himself and opens his big mouth before he can talk himself back out of it.</p><p> </p><p>“You know, you haven’t taken me on a proper date in a while.” He says it lightly, teasing, enough to cover the ridiculous nerves bubbling in the pit of his stomach. It’s hard not to twitch when Conner’s head whips around, but Conner laughs, gesturing around them at the silhouettes of the groups of people clustered and waiting for the fireworks.</p><p> </p><p>“What, this doesn’t count? Food, fireworks? What’s your definition of a date, huh?” His voice is filled with mock-outrage, and Tim has to roll his eyes even though he’s grinning. Scooting back to sit against the tree they’d claimed as the crowd around them starts to murmur in anticipation of the fireworks, Tim hums thoughtfully.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, for starters, I think if it’s a date, your mom can’t drive us to it,” he says, and Conner exhales like Tim has punched him.</p><p> </p><p>“Wow, brutal,” he says, moving back to sit with Tim, his arm pressing against Tim’s shoulder in the dark. “Alright, fine, we’ll leave Ma at home all by her lonesome next time. You get to break the news to her, though.”</p><p> </p><p>“Somehow I think she’ll survive the blow. She’ll probably be glad to get us both out of her hair at the same time,” Tim says, chuckling. “So, what do you say? Next weekend?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” Conner says as the first firework launches, keening high into the air. As it bursts among the stars, bright red sparks showering through the air, Tim barely catches the end of Conner’s sentence. “That sounds nice.”<br/><br/>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim and Conner make it through the fireworks without further incident, although Tim does, embarrassingly, almost nod off on Conner’s shoulder towards the end. Conner doesn’t let that one go for a couple of days (“In the middle of <em>fireworks? Really? </em>Okay, so what <em>is</em> the worst thing you’ve ever slept through?”), but they seem to be on steadier ground again, Conner bumping and teasing him, horsing around like nothing ever happened. It’s a relief to Tim, and he gets a few days reprieve before the next bucket of cold water drops on him.</p><p> </p><p>This time, at least, it has nothing to do with Conner. Or as little to do with Conner as anything seems to, these days. Tim is standing at the sink of the Kent house one afternoon while Conner is still at school, peeling potatoes for Ma, when he looks up and sees a man skirting the flower gardens behind the house. He looks nervous, glancing around himself like he’s afraid of all the open space, and is clutching a camera between his hands. The face is vaguely familiar, and Tim puts down the potato he’s holding, but not the knife.  </p><p> </p><p>“Ma, I’ll be back in a minute,” he says, leaning forward to keep the man in his line of sight and wiping a hand on his jeans as he watches the man poke his head around the side of the house. The guy balks, presumably at the chicken pen, and Tim slips out the back door while he’s distracted.</p><p> </p><p>It’s seconds before Tim is on him, the guy’s camera tumbling from his hands as Tim jams an elbow into his stomach and shoves him up against the back of the house, potato knife held steady at the man’s throat. It’s undoubtedly the guy from the cookout, and all of Tim’s instincts are shouting warnings at him, the back of his neck prickling with dread. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”  </p><p> </p><p>Tim keeps his voice low and steady, and the guy is already practically hyperventilating, chest heaving under the forearm Tim is keeping him pinned with. “I—I, uh—I was just, um….” Pressing the knife a hair more firmly against the man’s throat, Tim raises his eyebrows.</p><p> </p><p>“You were just…?”</p><p> </p><p>The guy breaks pretty much instantly. “Oh god, don’t kill me! Nobody told me you were violent! Jesus, I didn’t sign up for this. I was looking for you, alright?” That catches Tim’s attention—he’s been so worried about all of Conner’s problems, he hadn’t accounted for somebody having it out for <em>him</em> all the way out here in Kansas.</p><p> </p><p>“For me? Why?” The guy stares at him.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re… Tim Drake-Wayne, aren’t you? Why are strangers with cameras usually looking for you?” Tim shifts the angle of the blade just enough to remind this guy that he’s not in any position to be sassing Tim. Narrowing his eyes, Tim frowns.</p><p> </p><p>“Answer the question, please.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, sure, <em>now</em> you’ve got manners,” the guy mutters, and Tim almost wants to laugh. “There’ve been all kinds of rumors online about you hanging around in some podunk town, and some people have been saying it’s ‘cause you got a boyfriend out here or something. The agency sent me out here to see if I could get any decent pictures.” Tim snorts in the guy’s face, just to prove him wrong about the “manners” quip. He doesn’t want this man to think he has any manners at all.</p><p> </p><p>“And by ‘decent’, I assume you mean ‘indecent’,” Tim says, flat and unimpressed. The guy shrugs, not bothering to deny his intentions, and Tim presses in closer, crushing him into the side of the house. “Listen, I get that. It’d probably be a huge payday to sell the photo that breaks the story about me hiding out here, having some gay tryst with a strapping young farmhand.” The guy actually bothers to nod, to the extent that he can without puncturing his own throat on Tim’s knife.</p><p> </p><p>“Right. That’s great and all, but this house? Happens to belong to a woman whom my family respects very deeply and considers a dear friend, and I have a very strong interest in protecting her privacy. Which means that I’m going to let go of you and allow you to leave in a minute here, but—if I ever catch you or anyone else in your profession setting foot on this property again without Martha Kent’s explicit permission to do so? I will <em>personally</em> ensure that that person never publishes so much as a stock photo or a BuzzFeed quiz ever again. Got it?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, pal, I got it,” the guy says, nodding quickly and shallowly and beginning to squirm in Tim’s grasp. Tim smiles and manages to smack the guy’s head against the siding as he steps back.</p><p> </p><p>“Not your pal. Get the fuck off of this property.” The guy stoops just long enough to grab his camera before practically sprinting off the way he came. Following him around the corner of the house and a few yards up the driveway, Tim watches until he’s jogged all the way off the farm and well down the road on the way back to wherever he left his car. Tim hopes he parked a long way off.</p><p> </p><p>“So was that like, the most fun you’ve had since you got here?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim whirls around so quickly he almost knocks himself off-balance, finding Conner lounging against the porch railing with his arms crossed, backpack still slung over one shoulder. He’s grinning at Tim in a way that makes Tim’s stomach twist with heat, summons up the frantic memory of Conner crushing him up against the alley wall, his thumb brushing Tim’s throat. His breath catches in his throat, and for a second Tim imagines doing something very stupid, like marching up the porch stairs to meet Conner and pushing him back against the railing, dragging him down to kiss him. It’s so much worse now that he <em>knows</em> what that feels like, and he has to force himself to think of something deeply unsexy, like all the potatoes he still has to peel, to get himself back under control. Hoping wildly that none of that shows on his face, Tim shrugs.</p><p> </p><p>“I didn’t hate it. How much did you hear?” He cocks an eyebrow at Conner, trying to act like the combination of the paparazzi trying to get the sordid details of his supposed love life and Conner <em>smirking</em> at him like that isn’t making him desperately wish he <em>did</em> have a love life to speak of.</p><p> </p><p>“Enough,” Conner says, gesturing Tim up the stairs in front of him. As Tim passes, Conner’s eyes flash down, and he laughs incredulously as he follows Tim up the steps. When Tim glances back over his shoulder, Conner’s eyes are wide, alarmed and maybe just a little admiring. “Holy shit, did you threaten him with a <em>knife</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim shrugs again, leading the way back into the kitchen and thinking stoically about potatoes. Definitely not about that look on Conner’s face. “It was good timing. I just happened to have it in my hand when I saw him.”</p><p> </p><p>“You are so vicious,” Conner says, and it doesn’t sound like an insult at all. Tim puts his head down and picks up another potato.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Sorry if the middle got a little slow?? I can't tell but I wanted to write like a big fun Smallville community event... Also I've wanted to write a scene with some paparazzi guys creepin around for a while but I just finally indulged myself lol. The potato knife was a bolt of pure inspiration if I do say so myself ??</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Chapter 11</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Uhh okay so I feel like I should mention up front here that this chapter features what I guess would best be described as a brief, unlawful arrest. It's discussed throughout most of the last 3/4 of the chapter, so I've described the incident in the end notes for people who aren't sure if it will bother them, but if you think it will, you may honestly just want to skip this chapter. I tried to get somewhat accurate details for that part but I might have totally fucked it up, sorry if so! </p><p>Also, moving forward there will probably be occasional moments of canon-typical violence. Heads up!</p><p>Anyway, um. This chapter is fully 10,000 words lmfao so? buckle up?? And enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>To Tim’s deep horror, Conner does, in fact, plan a proper date for them the next weekend.</p><p> </p><p>After the paparazzi incident, things get quiet again for the most part. Conner mentions to Tim that the guy with the camera has still been hanging around, but only on public property. He chuckles when he describes how nervous the guy looks now, treading carefully as if he’s afraid that setting foot on <em>any</em> piece of private property will summon Tim up out of the shadows, potato knife in hand.</p><p> </p><p>“In his defense, I have a lot of practice with having that effect on people,” Tim says, not bothering to hide his smile as he stitches up granny squares at the kitchen table. He’s thinking about making a quilt for his apartment.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, I know,” Conner says, looking up from his notes to grin at Tim and dragging the eraser of his pencil across his bottom lip. “Still funny.”</p><p> </p><p>That had been pretty much the end of it, and now it’s Saturday night and Tim is forcing himself to stop fidgeting with his hair in the bathroom mirror because he can’t take much time getting ready, because this <em>isn’t</em> a real date. Taking a last, deep breath, Tim steps out of the bathroom and heads down the stairs, triple-checking that he has his wallet as he goes. Conner is leaning over the back of the couch when he comes down, chatting with Ma as she watches some movie on TV. Tim silently apologizes to Ma for having the sort of thoughts that the sight of Conner leaning over like that in his just-tight-enough jeans gives him under her roof.</p><p> </p><p>Kon looks over his shoulder at Tim and smiles—Tim, heroically, does <em>not</em> hang onto that visual for later, and manages to smile in return, carefully taking even, steady breaths.</p><p> </p><p>“Ready when you are,” Tim says, and Conner gives a lazy salute and leans down to kiss Ma on the cheek.</p><p> </p><p>“We’ll be back in a couple of hours,” Conner tells her, and Ma gives a knowing little chuckle that sets Tim’s nerves on edge. It’s bad enough trying to convince <em>himself</em> that this isn’t actually a date, isn’t a big deal; he certainly doesn’t need to add anyone else to the list, risk someone implying anything that might make Conner uncomfortable.</p><p> </p><p>“I won’t wait up,” Ma says, and Tim can’t see her face, but he’s pretty sure he catches the tips of Conner’s ears turning just a little pink. “You boys have fun and drive safe.”</p><p> </p><p>“We will,” they say in unison, and Ma laughs them out the door.</p><p> </p><p>The drive into town is quiet, and Tim thinks it’s a companionable sort of silence, although the fluttering feeling bouncing rapidly between his stomach and chest makes it hard to tell. They park in the same quiet little public lot as the first time Conner took him on a “date”, but Conner leads him in a different direction this time, across Main Street and then off it entirely. They wind up in a quieter corner of town, where a few small restaurants and mildly artsy shops make up a tiny retail district. It’s kind of adorable, and Tim finds himself charmed despite the urge to tease Conner about the lack of creativity.</p><p> </p><p>“Dinner? I knew I liked you for your creativity.” He caves as Conner opens the door of one of the restaurants for him, tries to use the gentle jab as cover for the way he’s struggling not to let his breathing get too out of hand. It’s one thing to joke about going on dates, but this is edging a little too close to the genuine article for Tim’s comfort.  </p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, yeah. We actually haven’t done this yet, okay? Leave me and my sad date-planning skills alone,” Conner says, waving Tim ahead. Following him in, the host catches sight of Conner and nods at them to follow him before Conner even has to say anything. Small town. “Also, it’s Smallville. Our options are pretty limited unless you want to do some serious travelling, which I think would probably defeat the purpose of your vacation. It was this or bowling.”</p><p> </p><p>He cocks an eyebrow at Tim, the look pointed, and Tim waves him off as they slide into a booth, nodding knowingly. The restaurant is cozy and a little nicer than the other places they’ve been, but still casual enough that it doesn’t feel like they’re too young to be here. Cloth napkins, but only one spoon and fork. As much as Tim hates to acknowledge anything that’s going to make this a good date, which is even worse than the fact that it feels like kind of a <em>real</em> date, Conner seems to have picked pretty well.</p><p> </p><p>“No, I get it,” Tim says, picking up a menu and starting to flip through it. “You wisely chose to take me to dinner because you knew how embarrassed you would be when I kicked your ass at bowling.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner stops in the middle of picking up his own menu to scoff, looking offended. “Uh, no. <em>Highly</em> unlikely. Have you ever even <em>been</em> bowling, New Jersey?”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, first of all, I’ll have you know that Gotham is the bowling capital of the east coast,” Tim says, pointing an aggrieved finger at Conner. “Which, frankly, probably explains a lot. But I will <em>also</em> have you know that I got banned from Dick’s birthday parties when I was sixteen because he was a sore loser about me snatching the bowling tournament crown out from under his nose three years in a row.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, right, because <em>he</em> was a sore loser. Nothing to do with you whatsoever, I’m sure.” Conner is obviously fighting to keep a straight face, and Tim turns his nose up, sits back and crosses his arms over his chest.</p><p> </p><p>“I have no idea what you’re implying. I’m always extremely gracious when I hand someone their ass at the bowling alley.” Conner laughs, and Tim can’t help smiling, too.</p><p> </p><p>He’ll be damned if it’s not a lovely evening. He had been teasing Conner about going on <em>real dates</em> to keep up appearances, but he’s pretty sure their “real dates” aren’t supposed to feel like… real dates. The sensation makes him hyperconscious of himself in a way he usually isn’t when he’s out and about with Conner, thinking about where his hands are and whether he’s sitting up straight enough or too straight, sure that any slight slip of body language will reveal to Conner exactly how much Tim <em>wants</em> this to be real.</p><p> </p><p>Blessedly, Conner seems oblivious. They spend a while brainstorming ideas for his English essay, and a while debating whether the latest non-update Sujan had passed on to them from Simon—things are going well, research is steady, his supervisor is nice, he likes Metropolis—is good news or bad. Tim is finally starting to relax, barely twitches when Conner bumps their ankles together under the table, when Conner springs a well-meaning trap on him.</p><p> </p><p>“Y’know, you seem more energetic lately, but not… that relaxed. Are you doing okay? Do you actually like being here?” He seems genuinely concerned, and a pit starts to form in Tim’s stomach, cold dread creeping up from the base of his spine. He needs to be careful here.</p><p> </p><p>“I do,” he says, and knows it sounds too cautious, tries to soften it with a smile. “I’m definitely sleeping better, for one. It was kind of freaky how quiet it is at night when I first got here, but I think it’s helping a lot. And Smallville is a good place to get away to. Everybody’s nice, which is a real change of pace.” He’s pretty sure his laugh sounds natural, but the corners of Conner’s mouth twist a little further down, and Tim thinks maybe he’s really in trouble now.</p><p> </p><p>“Right, that’s good. But… do you get what I mean when I say you still seem pretty tense? If there’s something I’m doing, or you need something, or if you just want to go home early… I mean, you’ve already been here a whole month. It’s been great, but if you don’t want to stay the whole summer, I get it.”</p><p> </p><p>Despite the fact that he had actually considered bailing early on, the idea of giving this up prematurely, going back to his empty apartment and returning to the endless juggling act of balancing his business responsibilities with his night life… the prospect feels unbearably bleak when he thinks about it now, bordering on pointless. It's strange, when he had been so reluctant to leave, to realize he really <em>doesn’t</em> want to go back, not yet.</p><p> </p><p>He knows, deep down, that he’ll always love the feeling of protecting people, making his city and the world safe from the kinds of people who take advantage, prey on anyone weaker or just less ruthless. Giving it up permanently will likely never be an option for him—he’s a person who needs to take action, and there’s nothing quite as satisfying as ruining someone who’s climbing their way up some twisted ladder by stepping on other people, frequently grinding their heel in just for the sheer, gross pleasure of it. Maybe it makes Tim not much better than them, but it’s a straightforward way of making the world a little less awful in a life where nothing feels straightforward at all.</p><p> </p><p>Here in Smallville, though, even being away from all that, everything that’s been his life for so long, even with complications cropping up at every turn, he’s begun to feel anchored again. He hadn’t realized just how adrift he’s been in Gotham and when he goes hopping around the world, but being here, being part of a home, existing in someone’s orbit on a daily basis, he thinks that the sensation of gravity is more a comfort than a weight.</p><p> </p><p>When he looks back at Conner, he realizes he’s been quiet for too long—Conner is watching him with so much nervousness and concern that Tim reaches out to grab his hand on reflex, smiling. “No, I don’t want to go back early. I mean, you can kick me out whenever you want if you get tired of having a house guest, but it’s… good. Being here with you.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner glances down at their hands, and when he looks back up, Tim realizes his mistake too late. Conner’s expression is open in a way Tim has never seen it, lips curved in a tentative smile that’s sweet and hopeful and <em>vulnerable</em>, like Tim being happy to be with him is an unexpected gift, something to treasure. The thought, the idea that <em>he</em> could ever put that look on Conner’s face, is overwhelming, and Tim’s heart slams against the cage of his ribs so hard that the sensation actually leaves him a little breathless, the barest gasp escaping him. Conner’s eyes widen.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” he breathes, and Tim has no idea what his own face is doing, but Conner is staring silently at him like Tim has struck him dumb. They sit like that for what feels like entirely too long—Tim has no idea what’s going on in Conner’s head, what he’s supposed to be doing with a reaction like this, and it's a little bit terrifying. It’s only when Conner looks down at their hands again that Tim notices himself trembling.</p><p> </p><p>Finally, the surprise on Conner’s face softens into something more like <em>amazement</em> (but that can’t be right), and then he’s shifting their hands, twining their fingers together in a slow, deliberate slide of skin that makes Tim wonder if Conner has recently gained the ability to set things on fire with just his touch. Conner is still <em>looking </em>at him in a way that makes Tim feel like his stomach is trying to take up residence somewhere north of his lungs, and—</p><p> </p><p>“Do you guys want any dessert?”</p><p> </p><p>They both jump, and the waitress smiles patiently at them, eyebrows raised expectantly. It takes a second for Tim to gather his wits, shoot a glance at Conner, and decide that whatever <em>this</em> is, it’s not a conversation he wants to be having in the middle of a half-full restaurant.</p><p> </p><p>“No thank you,” he says, and lets go of Conner’s hand—that shouldn’t <em>ache,</em> he thinks, but it does—to reach for his wallet. “How do I pay? Can I give you my card now?” She blinks at him, cocks her head.</p><p> </p><p>“Don’t you want the bill first?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not really,” he says sincerely, smiling in a way that he hopes makes him seem flustered rather than rude. Not that he needs a lot of help seeming flustered right now, anyway. “I just realized that we’re running late, so I’d like to just take care of it as quickly as possible, if it’s not too much of an inconvenience.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” she says, and pauses to look around the restaurant, taking a mental account of her tables. “No, I think everybody’s good for now, I can go run your card real quick and bring everything back.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thank you so much,” Tim says, handing his card over. Then, of course, he’s alone with Conner again, and he’s not quite brave enough to look up and see if Conner still has the same look on his face, if maybe whatever had been happening between them was a momentary lapse of judgement that he’s now thought better of. Not that Tim can quite bring himself to believe that it was really what he wants to hope it was, but—</p><p> </p><p>The waitress actually does bring his card back very quickly, taking long strides back across the restaurant in an effort to hustle them along. She hands him his card, the receipt, and a pen and wishes them a good night, and he signs and pulls two twenties out of his wallet, tucking them under the pen for her. Conner laughs at him a little when he sees it.</p><p> </p><p>“What?” Tim asks; he feels himself flush, and god, they need to get <em>outside</em>, anywhere Tim can figure out what the hell is going on. Conner just grins and shakes his head, keeping pace with Tim easily as he hurries toward the door.</p><p> </p><p>“Do you always tip like a rich person?” Tim shrugs and shoulders his way out the front door. Under any other circumstances he wouldn’t feel so defensive about it, but he’s acutely aware of everything he could possibly be doing that might be wrong or awkward or off-putting right now, and he shoves his hands in his pockets to keep them from curling into anxious fists.</p><p> </p><p>“I mean, I <em>am</em> a rich person. Might as well use it. And she was really nice about getting us out fast.”</p><p> </p><p>“Hey,” Conner says, reaching out to catch Tim’s wrist. Tim stops abruptly, realizing just how fast he was barreling away from the restaurant, but Conner still doesn’t let go. He tugs at Tim’s wrist, gently pulling his hand out of his pocket, and slips his hand into Tim’s, tangling their fingers together. “I’m just teasing. It’s nice that you’re not stingy with people who probably need it more than you do.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Tim says, tries to sound normal, but he knows he’s staring openly at their hands. He shouldn’t be surprised, since this kind of contact has become pretty commonplace since they started the whole fake-dating thing, but this, the way Conner’s looking at him… it doesn’t feel like they’re playing anymore. Conner starts walking again, and Tim lets himself be led through Smallville’s quiet streets, thoughts chasing each other in useless circles around his skull.</p><p> </p><p>They walk in silence all the way back to the truck, streetlights flickering on overhead as they go, and Conner’s thumb brushes the back of his hand with each gentle swing of their arms. It’s driving him a little bit crazy. It feels like there’s electricity buzzing under his skin, and when they reach the truck and Conner doesn’t let go to help him in, doesn’t even unlock the doors, just leans against the side of the bed and keeps holding Tim’s hand, that feeling blossoms fully into <em>heat</em>.</p><p> </p><p>“Um,” Tim says, and edges a little closer to the truck. That turns out to be a bad idea, because Conner turns to keep facing him, and suddenly he’s boxed in, tucked between Conner, the door, and the passenger side mirror. He’s not trapped so badly that he couldn’t make a break for it if he wanted to (and he <em>is</em> considering it), but enough that he’s made acutely aware of Conner’s body, the scant inches between them, the fact that Conner is <em>still</em> holding his hand with something too close to tenderness for Tim to think about.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey,” Conner says, low and soft and <em>close</em>, and if Tim hadn’t already felt like his entire body was on fire, that would certainly have done it. “Could you look at me for a minute?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim, god help him, shakes his head—he doesn’t trust his voice, <em>knows</em> that his face will give him away, and even though something is obviously happening, he can’t—he still <em>can’t</em>—</p><p> </p><p>Conner just keeps stroking the back of his knuckles, though, and he can hear the smile in Conner’s voice when he says, “Okay. Is it alright if I talk to you?”</p><p> </p><p>That’s easy enough—he pretty much always wants to listen to Conner, so he nods, and Conner shifts just a fraction of an inch closer, causing Tim’s heart to leap in his chest. Conner chuckles, because of course, he must have <em>heard</em> that, must have heard Tim’s stupid, traitor heart back in the restaurant, too, and Tim knows he’s done for.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, thanks. Because—and you can tell me to fuck off if I’m way off base here and it doesn’t need to be a big deal, but I’ve been thinking, I <em>really</em>—"</p><p> </p><p>“Conner Kent?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim does glance up now, sees the irritation on Conner’s face, and leans around him far enough to get a look at the intruder. It’s a duo, a man and a woman, both dressed in the black suits and ties of the most stereotypical Hollywood-style government goons. Tim is surprised they’re not still wearing their sunglasses even though the sun has set.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh,” Conner starts, but Tim pushes out of the space Conner has him tucked into, keeps Conner’s hand in his own but plants himself in front of Conner instead.</p><p> </p><p>“Who’s asking?” The woman smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes, doesn’t put Tim at ease in the slightest.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m Agent Phillips, and this is Agent Crowder,” she says, and Tim can feel a knot of tension forming between his shoulders. “Are you Conner Kent?”</p><p> </p><p>“Why do you need to know?” She’s going to have to work harder than <em>that</em> if she wants to get anywhere near Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s not something we’re at liberty to discuss, but we will need you to answer the question,” Crowder says. Tim opens his mouth to retort, because he’s not going to stand here and take shit from a pair of creeps playing dress-up as federal bullies, especially not when they won’t even tell him what they want with Conner, but Conner puts his free hand on Tim’s shoulder. Tim shoots Conner a look over his shoulder, but Conner just smiles at him, unsure and brave. Tim hates it.</p><p> </p><p>“Um, I’m Conner. Is everything okay?”</p><p> </p><p>“Hi, Conner,” Agent Phillips says, locking onto Conner. “We’re going to need to ask you to come with us.” Tim takes a half step back, pushing Conner into the side of the truck behind him, and narrows his eyes.</p><p> </p><p>“Is he being arrested? Who do you work for? I haven’t seen any badges.” Phillips and Crowder look at each other, and Agent Phillips sighs and takes a step forward, reaching into a jacket pocket and producing a badge. It looks real enough to Tim’s well-trained eye, but the department stops him cold—Department of Defense, Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program.</p><p> </p><p>“You—UFOs, really? You’re investigating <em>aliens</em>?” He’s a good enough liar that it comes out appropriately scornful, but he has to work to pry his teeth apart to spit it out. This is bad on a level that Tim doesn’t even want to think about. It’s like a bucket of cold water down the back of his neck, and he takes his phone out, grabbing her badge and pulling it close enough to snap a picture. It gives him a mean sort of satisfaction to watch her blinking rapidly against the camera flash. He tucks his phone back in his pocket, but not before setting it to video and hitting record, leaving the microphone just far enough out of his pocket that the sound won’t be muffled.</p><p> </p><p>“Our investigations are classified,” Crowder informs him, and Tim can’t help it, snorts derisively.</p><p> </p><p>“Too embarrassed to tell anyone about them?” Crowder presses his lips together, and Phillips puts her hands on her hips.</p><p> </p><p>“Listen, kid—”</p><p> </p><p>“Timothy Drake-Wayne.”</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, Timothy, we need Conner to come with us. We understand that you don’t like the idea, but what we’re dealing with is bigger than your desire to go home and make out with your boyfriend.”</p><p> </p><p>“Great. So, are we free to go? Or <em>is</em> he being arrested?” Tim doesn’t bother answering the barbs—let her think he’s some pissy teenager upset that his date was interrupted. It’s upsettingly obvious where this is going, and the more she dismisses him, the easier it is to make sure she says what he needs her to say. She sighs again, hold up her hands, a “have it your way” gesture.</p><p> </p><p>“If you’re going to make us do it that way, Timothy, then he’s being detained, and yes, the reason why is classified. You are free to go, he is not. This didn’t have to be unpleasant, you know.” Tim smiles. It’s not a nice expression.</p><p> </p><p>“It never does, I bet.” Turning to Conner, Tim takes a deep breath. Conner looks upset now, scared, and the sight of it sets a vicious feeling blooming in Tim’s chest.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m going to take a guess here, okay? Sorry if I’m wrong,” he murmurs, and reaches up to hook a hand in Conner’s collar, dragging him down and pushing him back against the side of the truck to kiss him. He feels Conner’s chest hitch under his knuckles, and then there’s a hand cupping his elbow, one at his waist, and Conner is kissing him back, slow and wanting. The feeling of Conner’s lips, pressing and sliding soft against Tim’s own, kissing him <em>back</em>, is still overwhelming, but if their first kiss had been a wildfire, searing through him and leaving him burnt out and gasping, this is a tsunami building, a slow, purposeful swell, heady and terrifying. The sound Conner makes in the back of his throat has Tim’s nails biting into his palm through the fabric of Conner’s shirt, wanting <em>more</em>, and Tim catches Conner’s bottom lip between his teeth as they separate, drawing the moment out as long as he can.</p><p> </p><p>“Don’t talk to anyone until I get you a lawyer,” Tim whispers as he pulls back, letting his hand slide down Conner’s chest on his way to slip the keys to the truck out of Conner’s pocket. He’s still got one hand on the back of Conner’s neck, and he squeezes gently, eyes locked on Conner’s. Conner seems a little dazed, and Tim pushes forward again, stealing one more, brief kiss. “Okay? No matter what they ask you, just tell them you want to wait for your lawyer. I’ll take care of it, I’ve got you.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner nods, and his face is still apprehensive as he looks over Tim’s shoulder, but he straightens up and Tim steps reluctantly out of the way. Crowder waves Conner forward, and Phillips heads back towards their black SUV, rummaging in the passenger’s side for a minute. As Conner walks towards the car, still looking over his shoulder at Tim, she produces a box, and when she opens the lid, it emits a soft, green glow.</p><p> </p><p>Tim feels his stomach drop, and Conner is instantly pale and sweating, steps faltering as she pulls out a pair of handcuffs, set all the way around with fragments of Kryptonite. Watching Conner as his chest begins to heave, she smiles. “You’re not under arrest, Conner—this is just for our safety. Just in case,” she tells him, and Tim is pretty sure he would kill her if he could.</p><p> </p><p>He stands and watches as they push Conner into the back of the car, can just make out lines of pain and fear on Conner’s face before they close the door on him, and then the agents climb in themselves and pull out of the parking lot like nothing even happened. An incandescent sort of rage that he’s rarely felt begins somewhere around his fingertips and creeps upward until his entire body is thrumming with furious adrenaline. Pulling his phone back out of his pocket, he ends the video he’s been recording and thumbs to his contacts, unlocking the truck and climbing into the driver’s seat.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim? Everything alright?” Bruce picks up halfway through the second ring, and Tim feels the hysterical urge to throw his phone even though he needs it, needs the windshield of the truck intact.</p><p> </p><p>“I need your help,” he tells Bruce, and he can picture Bruce straightening up, the way his shoulders push back to attention as he makes the mental shift from Bruce to The Bat.</p><p> </p><p>“What happened?”</p><p> </p><p>“Some Department of Defense creeps took Conner. We were on a date, and—”</p><p> </p><p>Realizing what he’s said, Tim stumbles, even in his fury. “I mean, it wasn’t—well—” Bruce doesn’t comment, and Tim takes a breath to steady himself and try again. “We were in town, and two Department of Defense agents approached us, looking for Conner Kent. They kept insisting it was all classified, but I got them to clarify that they were detaining him. I’m pretty sure I got all the relevant audio, and I have a picture of one of their badges.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Bruce says, blessedly decisive. “Send me what you’ve got, and I’ll reach out to our contacts for the best criminal lawyer I can find. I highly doubt they’ve got any excuse to keep him for long.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thank you,” Tim whispers. As quickly as it had come on, the anger is subsiding to a low, steady undercurrent, and fear and helplessness are flooding the space it makes in his chest. His breathing is uneven and the only reason his hand isn’t shaking is because he’s gripping his phone so tightly to his ear that it can’t.</p><p> </p><p>“Of course, Tim. Are you alright?” Tim can hear Bruce shifting back again, his voice going gentle and concerned. Tim shrugs even though Bruce can’t see it.</p><p> </p><p>“They put him in handcuffs, Bruce. They had fucking <em>Kryptonite</em> <em>handcuffs</em>.” He can’t picture Bruce’s face now, has no idea what must be going through Bruce’s mind in the silence that follows that wretched little admission. It must have sounded awful, because Tim would never have expected what Bruce says next.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m flying out, Tim. I’ll let Clark know and be there in a few hours. Where are you?”</p><p> </p><p>“Still in the parking lot where they found us. I got the keys to Ma’s truck before they took him.” Tipping his head back against the headrest, he closes his eyes. He should probably put up some sort of protest, insist to Bruce that there’s no need for him and Clark to come, but there’s really nothing he can do here that Bruce can’t do better from the cave, and he finds that he wants the distraction, the comfort of the familiar when everything has gone so sideways.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright. I’m going to call Martha and let her know what happened. You head back to the Kent house when you feel like you can drive safely, and I’ll be there soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay. Thanks, Bruce.”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>It’s a while before Tim starts the truck, and he drives back slowly, not sure what he’s going to say to Ma. When he finally pulls up the driveway and heads for the house, he finds her sitting on the porch swing, clutching a cup of tea. She spots him coming up the steps and stands, holds her arms out to him, and as strange as it feels, he doesn’t resist.</p><p> </p><p>“Bruce called me and told me what happened,” she says, tucking his head down to her shoulder and wrapping surprisingly strong arms around his back. “That must have been terrifying, sweetheart. Are you alright?”</p><p> </p><p>It takes him a minute, but eventually he puts his arms around her waist, hugging her back. He can’t remember ever being the subject of such obvious familial affection, and the realization sort of makes him feel worse. He holds her a little tighter.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” he says hoarsely when he can manage it. He feels her pull back a little, looking at him. “I couldn’t stop them.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, honey,” She says, patting his back gently and stepping back to stroke his hair carefully, frowning at him. “It wasn’t your job to stop them. I’m sure you did everything you could, and you made sure that he’ll get good help. He’ll be okay, dear. Us Kents are tough.” She pats his cheek, and he does actually feel a little better, lets her guide him inside for his own cup of tea.</p><p> </p><p>He’s curled up half-asleep on the arm of the couch when the door opens hours later. Ma is sitting at the other end reading quietly, and she gets up and goes to greet Clark and Bruce as they step inside. It’s after midnight according to the box sitting on the TV stand, and Tim is feeling every minute. Sitting up, he meets Bruce’s eyes, and Bruce frowns, hugs Martha briefly in greeting before she shoos him off in Tim’s direction. Bruce crouches to get a better look at Tim, like he might have when Tim was fourteen and was lying on a couch in the manor with a bad cold. Even just that is a strange sort of comfort when Tim does, in fact, feel like he could be sick.</p><p> </p><p>“Holding up?” Bruce asks, reaching out to run his hand along the side of Tim’s head where he had been cradling it against his arm, smoothing the hair out of his face. Tim shrugs.</p><p> </p><p>“I guess. Any word from the lawyer?”</p><p><br/><br/>“Well, she found where they’re holding him, so she’s on her way now. Even that took some doing on her part, but apparently having the badge information was a big help.”</p><p> </p><p>Nodding, Tim picks at a loose thread on the hem of his shirt. He feels ridiculous, that he had worried so much about choosing it barely six hours ago. It seems so small and stupid now, when the world feels on the verge of crumbling. “That’s good,” he says when he remembers Bruce is probably waiting for an answer, is trying to be encouraging. “Where is he?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not far,” Bruce tells him, pushing to his feet. “They borrowed the county sheriff’s office. I guess they need a better reason to be able to transport him out of state. Once she gets all the paperwork sorted, she’ll have him home soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“You think they’ll let him go that easy?” Tim asks, not quite ready to feel hopeful. “People like that… they’re usually pretty fanatical.” Bruce chuckles, sits down besides Tim and claps a gentle hand on his shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Based on the phone calls I’ve had with her, I think they’ll be willing to do just about anything to get out of her crosshairs. Even a fanatic still has survival instincts.” Tim just nods again, watching as Clark and Ma talk in low voices by the door. Clark looks as worried as Tim feels, which sort of makes him feel better, actually. If everyone were keeping their cool, he would have to pretend to be completely in control of his emotions, which, despite his years of practice, isn’t an appealing thought right now. He’s never quite been able to hold it together where Conner is concerned, but at least he and Clark can panic together.</p><p> </p><p>“Why don’t you get some sleep if you can? I’ll keep an eye on things, let you know if the lawyer calls again.” The offer startles him a little, but Bruce’s smile is lined with concern, and Tim thinks this is probably Bruce being fatherly. Telling Tim that everything is okay, that Bruce will take care of him. It’s a rare form of affection, the warmth that Bruce has shown him tonight, and Tim realizes he doesn’t want to prove himself to Bruce right now or try to live up to anything. He kind of just wants to let his awkward, well-meaning father figure look out for him, so he shrugs, tries for a smile.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay. I’m… just gonna sleep here, though, I think.” Glancing toward the stairs, thinking of sleeping in Conner’s room without Conner’s reassuring presence somewhere over his head… he doesn’t like the thought of it. Bruce doesn’t object, and Tim tries to settle the exhausted nausea he’s feeling enough to drift off. It takes a while, but Bruce doesn’t go anywhere.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Bruce wakes him up again around two in the morning with a hand on Tim’s shoulder—he has a wicked cramp in his neck, can barely move his head, but finds himself instantly alert.</p><p> </p><p>“Can I put you on speaker?” Bruce is saying into his phone, and after a second he holds it up and presses a button. Ma leans in from where she’s tucked into the couch on Bruce’s other side, and Clark stops pacing and moves closer, which strikes Tim as a little funny.</p><p> </p><p>“I’ve got him, Mr. Wayne. GPS says eighteen minutes.” She hangs up.</p><p> </p><p>“My,” Ma says, blinking at Bruce's phone.  “She’s certainly very business-like, isn’t she?”</p><p> </p><p>“I suppose that's what you get for hiring the best,” Bruce says ruefully. “At least she's stopped cursing. She didn’t appreciate me dragging her out of bed.”</p><p> </p><p>The four of them migrate to the porch to wait—it’s warm enough, and the fresh air, the knowledge that he'll see Conner soon, relatively free of harm, helps Tim start to feel more human again. Clark has Ma tucked under one arm, staring into the distance, and Bruce waits in the doorway while Tim hovers near the top of the stairs.</p><p> </p><p>By Tim's count, it's only eleven minutes later when a sleek car, colorless in the darkness, turns up the driveway and pulls up to the house. Tim decides he likes this lawyer.</p><p> </p><p>Then the passenger's side door is opening and Conner is stepping out, leaning heavily on the roof of the car, and Tim stops caring if he likes the lawyer or not. He steps back to let Ma and Clark by, and the two of them meet Conner on the path to the stairs, Ma pulling Conner down into a tight hug and Clark wrapping his arms around both of them, making sure to get one arm under Conner’s shoulders to support him. Following them down the porch steps, Tim stands at a distance, half-listening as Bruce goes to talk to the lawyer.</p><p> </p><p>“Idiots,” she's saying, about as scornful as Tim has ever heard anyone say anything. “They were so fucking eager to get their hands on him, they didn’t even notice they didn’t have a leg to stand on. Always happy to disabuse assholes like that of the notion that their authority is unquestionable.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim definitely likes her, and he's pretty sure Bruce does, too, based on the genuine huff of laughter that escapes him. “You’re a good woman. I really can't thank you enough for flying out on such short notice—if there's ever any way I can return the favor, Lora, please let me know.”</p><p> </p><p>“Don’t make me an offer like that thinking I won’t take you up on it,” she warns him, and Tim sees Bruce <em>grin</em>, sharp and honest. It's funny, watching Bruce make friends.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m perfectly serious. Please, give my regards to your wife.”</p><p> </p><p>“I won't,” Lora tells him as she begins to climb back into her rental. “You’re welcome. She was not pleased that you pulled me out of bed at midnight. Anyway, you have my number if you have any more problems. And keep an eye on the kid, okay? He looked like he was having a major panic attack the entire time they had him in custody, and he still seems pretty rough.”</p><p> </p><p>“We’ll take good care of him. Thank you again.” She gives a lazy wave as she pulls the door closed, buckles up, and reverses abruptly back up the driveway.</p><p> </p><p>That leaves them all standing in the dark, and Ma finally steps back from Conner, waving to urge Clark to help Conner inside.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m really fine, Ma. Just a little shaky,” Conner tells her, and she puts her hands on her hips.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner Kent, you let Clark help you inside. The last thing I need is you tripping and putting a hole in my porch, you hear me?” That gets a laugh out of Conner, eases the tension a little, and Tim catches Bruce smiling as he steps back inside to wait for the rest of them. Tim follows him quickly, trying to stay out of Clark and Conner’s way, and then doesn’t know what to do with himself once he’s inside. It’s quietly killing him that he hasn’t been able to get a proper look at Conner yet, the need to know exactly how bad things might be gnawing at him.</p><p> </p><p>When Conner steps inside, Bruce puts a hand on Tim’s shoulder—Conner is certainly alive, so it’s not the worst Tim has ever seen him, but he looks… bad. Pale and grey, still visibly shaking from the effects of the Kryptonite, and there are sickly green bruises stretching up the forearm that isn’t covered by Clark’s hand, spilling out from under his wristband. The nausea that had subsided earlier comes back with a vengeance, and Tim is glad for Bruce’s steadying presence.</p><p> </p><p>When Conner spots Tim he smiles, though, pats Clark’s back and steps away. His knees mostly hold, but Tim takes two quick steps forward anyway, tucks himself under Conner’s arm in Clark’s place, and Conner actually does lean on him. He’s heavy, but Tim can hold him, and the weight of him against Tim’s side is a relief. Conner wraps his other arm around Tim, tucks his head down to rest his cheek against the top of Tim’s head.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks,” Conner says softly, and Tim can’t help himself, slides his other arm around Conner’s shoulders and presses up against him.</p><p> </p><p>“Anytime,” he whispers, and if it comes out a little more fiercely than he intends, it’s only because he means it. “Always.”</p><p> </p><p>He can feel the curve of Conner’s smile against his scalp, and Conner squeezes him carefully before letting go, straightening up to look at Bruce. Tim looks, too, although he kind of doesn’t want to know. Bruce is just standing there, though, hands in his pockets, a faint smile on his face that Tim knows is real.</p><p> </p><p>“Thank you so much, Mr. Wayne,” Conner says, even as Bruce tries to wave him off. “That was kind of terrifying, and I don’t know what I would have done if you and Tim hadn’t helped me. I know I, uh, didn’t make the greatest impression when I was younger, but if there’s ever anything I can do to help you out, just say the word.”</p><p> </p><p>“First of all, call me Bruce. But more importantly, please don’t worry about it, Conner. Even if you and Tim weren’t so… close, that entire situation was obviously wrong. I’m glad I could help facilitate getting you out of there quickly.” Bruce’s tone on the word <em>close</em> is laced with dry humor, and Tim feels the tips of his ears start to heat. He’s never going to hear the end of this when he goes home.</p><p> </p><p>Conner either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care, just smiles at Bruce. “Still, I’m serious, let me know if I can ever help. It probably doesn’t look like it right now, but I <em>am</em> sometimes useful.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll keep it in mind,” Bruce says, smiling tolerantly before turning to Tim. “I’m going to head out and let everyone get settled, but would you like me to stick around for a little longer? I need to be back by tomorrow morning, but I could find a room in town.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim glances at Conner, who shrugs. “I think we’re okay, Bruce. I doubt they’re going to come around twice in forty-eight hours if they come back at all, but we’re on alert for them now, anyway. We’ll manage, and I’ll let you know if things get out of hand again.”</p><p> </p><p>Bruce nods, puts a hand on Tim’s free shoulder and squeezes firmly. “Keep me updated. And try to enjoy the rest of your summer.” He glances at Conner, and when he looks back to Tim, his smile is a little too knowing for Tim’s comfort. “Don’t do anything I would do.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim has to laugh at that, and he shifts his grip on Conner a little so that he can get one arm around Bruce in a hug that’s even more awkward than usual. “Noted. Thanks, Bruce.”</p><p> </p><p>Bruce says his goodbyes to Ma and heads for the door, Clark looking reluctant to leave but following close behind him.</p><p> </p><p>“Clark will be back once he drops Bruce off,” Ma tells them, and Conner nods and yawns into Tim’s hair. Tim resists the urge to elbow him in the gut.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay. You think he’ll mind if I head to bed? I think I’m pretty much done for the day.”</p><p> </p><p>“Of course, dear, I’m sure you’re exhausted. And sleep in if you can manage it, alright? Clark and I will take care of everything in the morning.”</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Ma,” Conner says, and Tim can feel the stretch of his ribs as he stifles another yawn. Leaning over to give Ma one more hug, he nudges Tim in the direction of the stairs, and Tim obliges. It takes them a few minutes to get upstairs; Conner isn’t bouncing back from the Kryptonite exposure as quickly as he normally does, although Tim’s not sure if it’s because of how long he was in contact with it or because the sun is down. Either way, Tim has to half-push him up each step, and by the time they reach Conner’s room, he looks pretty dead on his feet.</p><p> </p><p>“You were just acting perky down there to make everyone feel better,” Tim accuses as he helps Conner to the bed, letting him sit down. Tim gathers up his usual pajamas for him, looking unhappily over his shoulder at Conner as he pulls a t-shirt and sweatpants out of Conner’s dresser.</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe,” Conner admits, and when Tim turns around to deposit the clothes by Conner’s head, he’s dropped completely back on the bed, eyes closed and arms flopped out to the sides. Sighing, Tim sits down on the floor at the foot of the bed and shoves one leg of Conner’s jeans up to his calf, beginning to loosen the laces on his boots. Conner starts, making a noise of pain as he pushes himself up on his bruised wrists to peer down at Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“You don’t have to—"</p><p> </p><p>“This is the only thing I’m helping you with,” Tim informs him, keeping his eyes focused on picking the laces loose enough that he can work the shoe off Conner’s foot. “Don’t get used to it.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right,” is all Conner says as he settles back down, but Tim can hear the smile in it. Making quick work of the boots, Tim gets up to set them by the bedroom door, and when he turns around, Conner is just laying there, head turned to watch Tim. Something about the look on his face makes Tim’s stomach clench, his chest flutter, and Conner smiles as Tim feels his heartbeat quicken.</p><p> </p><p>Making his way back over to the bed, Tim stands close enough for Conner to twitch and knock his knee into Tim’s leg. Tim doesn’t quite know what to do with himself, not sure what he should say after the night that Conner’s had, but Conner, fortunately, seems to have a pretty good idea of what he wants. He reaches over to curl his fingers around Tim’s wrist, holding him gently in place, although Tim’s not sure he could leave if he wanted to, even if Conner weren’t touching him at all. The way Conner is looking at him is enough to root him in place for as long as Conner cares to keep him.</p><p> </p><p>“So, I guess maybe I wasn’t totally off-base earlier?” Conner asks, and he has to <em>know</em> it’s not fair to ask a question like that with such a fond smile on his face, with his thumb stroking the soft skin at the inside of Tim’s wrist. If he couldn’t hear Tim’s heart beating, Tim is sure he would be able to feel the frantic rhythm of his pulse, and Tim swallows hard, shakes his head slowly.</p><p> </p><p>“No,” he says, and it comes out barely more than a whisper. He still almost doesn’t want to say it, can’t believe that if he lets this be real, gives this small, tender part of himself to Conner, he might actually be allowed to have something so good. “You were—I—”</p><p> </p><p>Conner pulls him down with the slightest tug of Tim’s wrist, none of his strength behind it, giving Tim plenty of time to disengage or put space between them. It strikes Tim, how someone with such overwhelming power could grow into one of the kindest, most careful people Tim has ever met, and then Tim is lying down next to Conner, one hand resting on Conner’s chest with Conner’s fingers still cradling his wrist. He keeps his other arm tucked under himself, propping himself up to keep his weight off of Conner’s bruised wrist, and that leaves him looking down at Conner with bare inches left between them.</p><p> </p><p>“Hi,” Conner murmurs, and Tim leans forward, eyes drifting closed, and kisses him.</p><p> </p><p>The press and slide of their lips is long and slow and tender, and Tim can’t remember ever being kissed like this—wanting, but not urgent, like Conner is content that they have all the time in the world. Tim feels Conner’s free hand come up, moving languidly across Tim’s hip, dragging a maddening line of heat across his lower back and up until Conner can curl one thick arm around Tim’s waist, pulling Tim closer so that Tim is laying halfway on top of him. Tim isn’t sure if he’s actually trembling or if he’s the only one who can feel the hot vibrations thrumming beneath his skin, but he has to pull back, breathe shakily against the corner of Conner’s mouth, nose pressed into Conner’s cheek.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright?” Conner asks, voice low in Tim’s ear, and that’s enough to make Tim fully shudder, nodding.</p><p> </p><p>“I—” Tim starts, and has to stop to take another breath. “I can’t think of anything to say that’s not going to wildly inflate your ego.” The feeling of Conner’s laughter, his chest shaking under Tim’s hand and against his ribs, is better than anything Tim has imagined.</p><p> </p><p>“Rendered you speechless, huh?” He’s teasing, but his voice is all full of affection, <em>joy</em>, not a trace of smugness anywhere, so Tim lets it slide.</p><p> </p><p>“I will hurt you,” he says, no threat behind it, and tucks his face down into Conner’s neck, notices Conner’s own faint shiver at the ghost of Tim’s breath across his throat. It makes Tim feel better that maybe he’s not the only one who’s feeling a little uncomposed.</p><p> </p><p>“You wouldn’t. After all the bullying I endured today?” At that reminder, Tim pulls back enough to frown up at Conner, concern hitting him all over again.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Are</em> you okay? What happened?”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I’ll be fine. Probably just need to get some sleep and some sun in the morning and I’ll be back on my feet.” He pauses, tucks his chin down to brush his lips just above Tim’s eyebrow. It’s a little surreal how casually sweet the gesture is—Tim is still barely caught up to the idea that Conner might actually return his feelings, and being on the receiving end of such genuine affection makes him feel like he must still be asleep on the couch downstairs. “I don’t remember that much after they handcuffed me, not until they got me to the sheriff’s station. They kept asking me questions about who I was, where I was born, that kind of thing. Trying to trip me up while I was still adjusting to the Kryptonite exposure, I guess, but I just kept telling them I wanted a lawyer like you told me to.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim sits up slowly, leaving his hand on Conner’s chest for as he moves, and reaches down for Conner’s other hand. Resting his fingers on Conner’s wristband, he looks at Conner hesitantly, fingering one of the matte-black painted snaps holding it closed. “Do you mind?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner shakes his head, watching Tim with a look on his face that Tim can’t decipher. “Keep going,” Tim urges him, half because he wants to hear the rest and half because he can’t concentrate when Conner is staring that way.</p><p> </p><p>“Right,” Conner says, takes a second to remember where he left off. “I was kind of in and out for a while, I think, because I don’t really remember your lawyer friend getting there. But she, uh… I was kind of worried for their safety, honestly, she was <em>really</em> pissed. Apparently even though they kept saying they were only detaining me so they wouldn’t have to list any charges, the whole handcuffed, secreted away to an unknown location without my permission thing basically made it an arrest. After they admitted they couldn’t charge me with anything, she, uh—”</p><p> </p><p>Tim has eased the snaps of Conner’s wrist cuff open, hunching over his work, taking his time and being careful not to jostle Conner’s bruised wrist. Opening it makes his chest ache—he sets it aside and brushes his fingers over Conner’s wrist as lightly as he can. The bruises above and below the leather cuff aren’t so bad, pale green fading into nothing, but where the handcuffs had been, there’s a ring of angry, mottled neon green that’s turned into a slightly raised welt, hot to the touch and matching the mark on his other wrist. It makes Tim wonder at how long Conner held up under what must have been constant, excruciating pain, and Conner’s narration stutters to a halt as Tim bends at the waist to press his lips carefully just above the worst of the bruising.</p><p> </p><p>“She…?” Tim prompts, keeping his thoughts to himself. He presses Conner’s knuckles lightly into his chest, stroking the side of Conner’s hand just up to the point where the bruising begins. He’s allowed, he thinks, after the day they’ve had.</p><p> </p><p>“She, um. She had me out pretty quick and was… threatening to sue them or press charges or something, I think? But once she stopped yelling, we just had to fill out some paperwork and we left.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim nods, running his fingers back and forth over the heel of Conner’s palm, not sure what to say. “I’m sorry it happened,” is what he finally settles for, but it doesn’t quite feel adequate. “You didn’t—you didn’t deserve any of this. None of it was right.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner smiles warmly at him, lifts his hand out of Tim’s grasp to rest against Tim’s neck. Tim shifts closer and leans into the touch, eyes drifting half closed.</p><p> </p><p>“I know. I mean, I was pretty freaked out, but I’m okay, and sometimes people are just assholes—no stopping it. Pretty mad that they ruined my big speech, though.” Tim chuckles, raising an eyebrow.</p><p> </p><p>“You had a speech?” Conner snorts, and even under the circumstances, Tim has a hard time not reacting when he stretches a little and drags his thumb along Tim’s jawline.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, yeah. Only been working on my big confession for the last, like, six months. I was working up to it when they interrupted.”</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Six months</em>?” That bit of information stops Tim in his tracks, eyes wide, and he sits up a little straighter. “You—<em>that long</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>“Longer,” Conner says, grinning ruefully. “That was just when I decided I needed to get over myself and do something about it.”</p><p><br/><br/>“I’m the worst detective on the planet,” Tim decides, and Conner laughs, slips his fingers around the back of Tim’s neck.</p><p> </p><p>“Nah, I was working pretty hard to keep it under wraps. I just… this summer, I kept wondering if I was reading things wrong, and it was driving me a little bit crazy, so… I decided to just take the chance. I figured at worst you would probably just make fun of me forever, which I’m pretty sure you’re going to do anyway, so.”</p><p> </p><p>“You weren’t reading anything wrong,” Tim admits, feeling himself start to flush. “I… I think it’s been a long time for me, too, but I was… pretty out of it for a pretty long time. I never stopped to think about it until I got here and had to slow down, and then….” He shrugs, figuring Conner can put the rest together.</p><p> </p><p>“So, it only took trapping you on a farm with me for a month for you to realize what a great deal you’d been passing up?” Conner grins and strokes a finger along the edge of Tim’s earlobe, making him shiver slightly. Tim decides he’s going to have to keep an eye on this whole touchy-feely thing; it’s incredibly distracting. “Man, I could have saved myself <em>so</em> much time.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim smiles back, but it suddenly strikes him that they’ve sort of been dancing around the central issue this whole time. After getting a taste of this, more than he could ever have hoped for, he’s not sure his heart could take the realization that the whole thing had been a miscommunication. “I—”</p><p> </p><p>Conner’s eyes are already on him, but his expression goes a little more serious, patient and curious as Tim struggles to decide how he wants to say this. Finally, he decides he’s not going to be able to be eloquent about it, settles for honest instead. “I like you. A lot. And—I want to actually date you. Is that what we’re doing here?”</p><p> </p><p>“God, I hope so,” Conner says, gazing up at him. “I’ve been gone on you for so long I can’t even remember when it started. It would be really great if I could finally get Cassie to stop making fun of me about it.”</p><p> </p><p>“’Gone on me’?” Tim parrots, and when Conner flushes, Tim has to laugh, an overpowering sort of joy bubbling up in his chest. “Alright, farm boy. I’m… glad we’re on the same page.”</p><p> </p><p>“Cool,” Conner says, and slides his hand down Tim’s chest, curling his fingers loosely in Tim’s shirt. “You maybe wanna come back here and kiss me again?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim can’t say no to that, and he leans back over Conner, takes his time about it as he slides his palm up Conner’s neck, curls his fingers in the short, dark hair at his nape. Conner is looking at him with an intensity of <em>wanting</em> that flushes his whole body hot, has his breath catching in his throat, and it's hard to settle for just one kiss when Conner is pressing up under Tim’s hands, curling one big palm around Tim's hip, fingers slipping dangerously under the hem of his shirt.</p><p> </p><p>“We need to—” Tim loses his train of thought when Conner dips his head, presses his lips just under Tim’s jaw. It’s not an aggressive move, no biting or sucking or even licking, but just the sensation of Conner’s lips dragging across his skin, the <em>desire</em> that’s apparent in every move Conner makes and the thought of what that could become, plays havoc with Tim’s self-control. “We really need to go to sleep,” he manages, and Conner pulls away after a second makes an unhappy sound as he drops his head back to the mattress.</p><p> </p><p>“I know you’re right, but I’ve honestly never been less interested in sleeping.” Personally, Tim agrees, but he does feel some sense of responsibility to not keep an already-exhausted Conner awake all night, so he settles for pressing a tentative kiss to Conner’s cheek. Conner lights up immediately, which makes Tim’s stomach do a silly little flip. He feels ridiculous.</p><p> </p><p>“Me neither, but, you know. I’ll still be here in the morning,” Tim tells him, and Conner reaches up to cup his cheek, smile going soft.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” he agrees, and Tim’s not sure exactly what the tone of his voice means, but it makes his heart thump in his chest. “Just let me get changed, alright? Not gonna be happy if I pass out in my jeans.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim nods, gets up reluctantly and goes to sit on the air mattress, faces the window and pretends to look at things on his phone. It takes Conner longer than it usually would, dead tired and trying not to overtax his wrists, and finally he gives up and calls for Tim’s help getting his sleep shirt on. Tim has to fight hard not to laugh when he turns around, Conner sitting on the edge of the bed with his head half-stuck in the collar and his arms pinned to his sides. He looks pathetic, and Tim is happy to take pity on him, working his wrists through the sleeves as gently as possible and tugging the shirt the rest of the way down. Once he’s sorted, Conner hooks an arm around Tim’s waist, keeping him from retreating back to the air mattress.</p><p> </p><p>“Is it rushing things if I ask you to stay?” Conner asks, voice hushed and sleepy. Biting his lip, Tim cards a hand through Conner’s hair, leaning into the embrace. On the one hand, he’s slept incredibly soundly the few times he’s shared a bed with Conner. On the other, now that he knows what Conner will give him if he just asks, he’s not sure it’s going to be quite so restful—the drive to get his lips back on Conner’s and not stop this time is powerful.</p><p> </p><p>“No, but… your wrists,” Tim tries, putting up token resistance. He knows it’s probably not his best idea to acquiesce, but he’s wanted this so much that there have been moments when he thought it might really kill him. Now that he knows that there’s no reason <em>not</em> to live out a few of the aching fantasies that he hasn’t quite been able to smother, he’s quickly reaching his limit for self-denial. “I don’t want to hurt you if I roll over in my sleep or something.”</p><p> </p><p>“You can be the big spoon,” Conner offers, grinning up at him. Tim can’t help smiling back, tips forward to bury his face in Conner’s hair, looping his arms loosely around Conner’s neck.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, okay,” he whispers, and Conner presses a kiss to his collarbone, the contact warm and tingling even through Tim’s t-shirt. </p><p> </p><p>Tim makes short work of changing into his own pajamas, and there’s a goofy, swooping sort of sensation in his stomach as he climbs into bed next to Conner. It’s still exhilarating to know that he’s <em>allowed</em>, that he can wrap his arms around Conner and settle in at his side, hold him without having to hide it behind the thin guise of friendship or comfort for mutual distress. He can press up along Conner’s back, curl an arm around his waist and nuzzle into the space between his shoulder blades just because he wants to, because <em>Conner</em> wants him to.</p><p> </p><p>When Tim whispers goodnight, Conner reaches to tangle their fingers together, tugging Tim’s hand up to hold it against his chest—the left side, Tim notices, groggy and overly sentimental as the day finally starts catching up with him, now that Conner is safe and settled. He falls asleep thinking about the steady rhythm of Conner’s heartbeat, there just under his fingertips.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>About the unlawful arrest: Two members of a sub-department of the Department of Defense dealing with alien incidents interrupt Tim and Kon's date and "detain" Kon, handcuffing him with Kryptonite-laced handcuffs and taking him to an unknown location for questioning. Tim calls Bruce, who gets a lawyer on the case, and Kon is released after a few hours because the government agents have no charges to press. The lawyer takes him back to the Kent farm.</p><p> </p><p>Chapter fun fact: Conner's bruises inspired by my own recent painful bruising incident lol. Somebody dropped a ring down a vent at work, and as the smallest employee I ended up jamming both arms down the vent to get it back and bruising the shit out of myself. Do not recommend!! </p><p>ALSO, informal poll: how do we feel about smut in this fic? Cool? Not cool? Cool but put it in a separate one-shot? None of the above? Lemme know!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Chapter 12</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Ooh yall I don't even know, I just don't know. This one was hard to figure out and ooh it probably needs another week of editing, but?? Enjoy??? </p><p>(Also if you wanna read the porn, click the asterisk after the scene where you would expect porn to happen lol, towards the end of the chapter. I think the link works!!)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s soft morning sunshine on Tim’s skin, and he nuzzles into the mattress. He’s pretty comfortable, warm and sprawled face down on the bed, although he can feel the edge of the pillow just behind his head, and that might be nice. Trying to wriggle sideways, he realizes he can’t turn over, and when he tries to move his head backwards, he bumps into something solid.</p><p> </p><p>Through a haze of sleepy confusion, the night before starts to come back to him, and he stills even as Conner stretches, crushing Tim into the mattress a little before slinging his arm back over Tim’s shoulders. He sighs contentedly into the top of Tim’s head, groans when Tim squirms beneath him. They must have moved quite a bit in the night, because Tim is half-pinned beneath Conner, one of Conner’s legs hooked around him and Conner’s body pressing down on Tim’s right side from shoulder to mid-thigh. Tim is kind of amazed that nothing seems to have gone numb, no pins and needles prickling his limbs as he retracts his arm from where it’s tucked beside his head and pushes up hard enough that Conner is forced to roll over onto his side.</p><p> </p><p>“What?” he asks, a note of groggy whining is his voice that makes Tim huff, not quite awake enough to laugh.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re hogging the pillow,” he mutters, and sighs in relief at being able to turn over and get some neck support when Conner scoots back obligingly. He follows, tucking himself back up against Conner’s chest, wrapping an arm around Conner’s broad back and humming when Conner gets both arms around him, pulling him close. Tim doesn’t think he’s ever been on the receiving end of such a focused, full-body sort of affection, but he’s finding he doesn’t mind. Even though he’s not generally a touchy-feely sort of person and rarely thinks to reach out to others physically, Conner is kind of perfect for snuggling, all soft skin and fabric, warm and comfortable and <em>his.</em> Tim feels no desire to let go.</p><p> </p><p>It’s hard to say how much longer they drift in and out of sleep together, but Tim is finally driven out of bed by his protesting bladder sometime after eleven, according to his phone, which he stares at through slitted eyes as he brushes his teeth. He goes right back to bed once he’s gotten himself slightly cleaned up, splashed water on his face and finger-combed his hair a little, trading off with Conner for use of the bathroom. When Conner returns, he climbs back in bed, too, although they’re both awake enough that they’re not fooling themselves into thinking either of them is going to fall back to sleep.</p><p> </p><p>“How’re you feeling?” Tim asks as Conner arches off the bed, getting in a long, cat-like stretch before sighing and settling on his side, facing Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m good,” he says, smiling. “Still a little tired, but if I get up above the clouds for a little while, I should perk back up. The window’s pretty good, but I could use a little more sun.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s good,” Tim says, before letting himself reach for one of Conner’s hands, pulling it up to examine his wrist. He’s trying not to obsess about it, but he has a feeling that Kryptonite bruises in the shape of handcuffs are going to feature in his nightmares for a long time. Conner truly does look better now, though—the marks have faded to a thin band of green where the worst of the bruising was last night, and it’s comforting that there don’t seem to be any lingering effects.</p><p> </p><p>When Tim looks back up, Conner is watching him, looking worried, maybe a little sad. “Are <em>you</em> okay?” He slips his hand out of Tim’s grasp, cups Tim’s wrist and slides his hand up Tim’s forearm, past his elbow to stroke slowly up and down just below his shoulder. “I mean, I know I was the one who got like, borderline kidnapped, but I was pretty out of it from the Kryptonite most of the time, anyway. It can’t have been easy on you, either.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim isn’t sure if he wants to laugh or cry at that. “Conner, whatever I went through was <em>not</em> as bad as what you endured last night, okay? It was… pretty upsetting, but I wasn’t the one being physically tortured the entire time.” Conner shrugs and scoots a little closer to Tim, propping his head up on a hand.</p><p> </p><p>“Alright, it wasn’t <em>as</em> bad, but still. You looked pretty freaked out last night. Anything you wanna talk about?”</p><p> </p><p>Sighing, Tim rolls on his back to stare at the ceiling.  He figures if they’re going to do this whole dating thing he’s probably going to have to get used to talking about his feelings anyway, but it’s easier if he doesn’t have to look Conner in the eye at the same time. “It may have… brought up some old feelings.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah?”</p><p> </p><p>“…I already lost you once,” Tim says. He works to keep his voice even, let it be the statement of fact it is, but he can’t say anything else past the sudden tightness of his throat.</p><p> </p><p>“Shit,” Conner says, and Tim shrugs.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s… not great,” Tim finally manages when he can breathe again. “Knowing what the worst-case scenario is and feeling like you’re watching it happen all over again.” In his peripheral vision he sees Conner’s shoulders tense, his fingers flex like he’s trying not to curl them into a fist, but he feels like he needs to keep going. He should be able to <em>say</em> why he looked so bad last night, actually tell Conner what’s happening in his head.</p><p> </p><p>“I was scared. I would have gone after you if the lawyer hadn’t found you, but it could have been too late by then. I don’t know if… I don’t think I could—”</p><p> </p><p> He can’t finish the sentence, feels like he’s choking on it, but Conner is already reaching over and dragging him close, levering himself up over Tim so he’s up on his elbow, one hand braced next to Tim’s head, boxing the rest of the world out. Tim closes his eyes, can’t quite bring himself to look at Conner, but he can feel Conner’s breath on his cheek, the tenderness with which Conner presses his lips against the edges of the dark circles under Tim’s eyes that never quite go away, the scar that cuts through his left eyebrow, the bow of his upper lip.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim,” Conner says, and Tim feels Conner’s voice, low and aching in his chest. “Breathe, sweetheart. I’m right here.” Under any other circumstance it would be utterly condescending, would have had Tim snarling something viciously sarcastic in response, but the terror of watching those handcuffs close, the look on Conner’s face when they pushed him into the car, is still entirely too real. Tim forces himself to listen to Conner, takes a deep, stuttering breath and releases it slow and shaky.</p><p> </p><p>“There you go,” Conner murmurs, encouraging, and Tim hates it, hates that he needs this. “Tell me how to help?”</p><p> </p><p>“This—this shouldn’t be about me,” Tim manages, cringes at the sound of his own voice. Conner snorts, the huff of air hot against Tim’s skin.</p><p> </p><p>“What do you think <em>should</em> be about you, Tim?” Tim is sure he has something to say to that, some valid response, but he can’t think of it right now, not off the top of his head when he’s still struggling to fight down last night’s panic. “Let me help, sweetheart.”</p><p> </p><p>He wants to make fun of Conner for talking to him the same way he talks to the horses and cows when they’re upset, but. Conner has asked him to put away that avoidant sort of higher functioning for the moment, let himself be taken care of, and Tim <em>wants</em> to do that for him, doesn’t want to keep deflecting and justifying and repressing forever. It’s easier that way, of course, but Tim has never liked the easy way, has he?</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t know,” he admits, forces himself to look Conner in the eye. All of that shocking blue is overwhelming, but not more so than the look on Conner’s face, attentive and concerned and full of something that Tim can’t quite put a name to. “I don’t know if this will go <em>away</em>, Conner. I can’t pretend that I don’t know what it’s like when you’re gone, and you can’t promise me it won’t happen again, not really. I don’t—it’s not like I think about it all the time, but I can’t tell you that there’s anything you can do or say, or that someday I’ll get over it. I don’t… think this gets fixed.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Conner says, calm, steady as a rock, and Tim lets out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, the tightly wound knot of his body coming just a little undone. “You don’t need to get over it, Tim, and I don’t need to fix it. You’re already stronger than you should have to be, alright? I don’t want you to be made of stone. You’re allowed to still be hurt—I’m not going anywhere, not because of that.”  </p><p> </p><p>Tim nods, and Conner shifts so that he can stroke Tim’s hair, the side of his face. “Still, though, is there anything I can do to make you feel better? Not about the whole thing, but just… right now. In this moment. Tell me what you need?”</p><p> </p><p>It’s hard for Tim to know how to answer a question like that, to dig past layers of “should” and “can’t” and “have to” in his brain and hear himself under it all. It’s even worse trying to actually <em>say</em> what he wants, but….</p><p> </p><p>“Could you just kiss me?” he whispers, and <em>that’s </em>embarrassing, but it’s really all he wants right now. The solid warmth and weight of Conner, something that feels <em>good</em> to anchor him, remind him that not everything is bleak, not every moment is a disaster waiting to happen. Conner just smiles at him, eyes scrunching up affectionately, and obliges without a word, angling his head to press their lips together.</p><p> </p><p>Tim sort of marvels at how it’s <em>so good </em>every time. Conner is an objectively good kisser, Tim supposes, passionate and intense but restrained enough that he’s not sloppy, responsive to Tim, knowing when to pull back so that they can catch a breath and how to angle himself to avoid awkward bumping of noses or chins. That’s not all it is, though. Technique is certainly helpful, but kissing Conner is <em>exhilarating</em>, makes a warm, full feeling unfurl in his chest, like everything is right in the world. He’s happy when they’re moving together like this, light and joyful, but—</p><p> </p><p>“Come here, please,” he murmurs when they break apart, tugging at Conner’s waist. As good as kissing him is, Tim can still feel the prickling discomfort along his shoulders, a tension in his body thanks to the memory of just how mortal Conner is, and he wants more than just Conner’s lips on his. Conner lets Tim pull him down, settles between Tim’s legs and presses Tim into the bed with his weight, and <em>now</em> it’s just about perfect.</p><p> </p><p>Feeling Conner like this, bodies in contact everywhere as Tim wraps his arms around Conner’s neck, hooks one leg over the back of Conner’s thigh, it’s—well, it’s incredibly hot, especially through the soft, thin fabric of their pajamas, and Tim knows he’s going to have to work to keep himself from rushing into a situation he hasn’t actually had time to consider yet. More than that, though, it’s <em>comforting</em>, helps his muscles finally loosen up as he lets himself go and becomes present, sinks into the awareness that Conner is right where Tim needs him.</p><p> </p><p>Neither of them are in any hurry to move, and there’s a slow sort of heat building between them as Tim pushes up into Conner, lets himself enjoy the friction, lets his hands stray to slide up and down the powerful muscles of Conner’s back. He can’t help the stupid little gasp that escapes him when Conner drags his tongue along Tim’s bottom lip, and Tim opens his mouth to meet him, and it’s <em>so</em> good, hot and slick and wet, and—</p><p> </p><p>Conner pulls back, laughing as he drops his head to Tim’s shoulder, pushing himself back up to put an inch or two of space between them. Tim is breathless, panting, and he lets his fists stay curled in the back of Conner’s t-shirt as Conner turns to nuzzle Tim’s neck.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” he says, still sort of chuckling, “but I’m gonna have a situation here if we keep this up.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim strongly considers the possibility of telling Conner he doesn’t care, that he’s happy to keeping going as far as Conner wants to, and he wouldn’t be lying, but… Conner probably has the right instinct here, to take things a little slower than that. After all, as much anxiety as Tim is still fighting about last night’s disaster, he’s supposed to be convincing himself that everything is fine, that they’ll have the whole summer together and as long as they want afterwards. There’s no rush, and he’d rather take his time, do what they want, when they want, and <em>because</em> they want, not spurred too fast by Tim’s fear.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s okay,” he says, reaches up to slide his fingers across Conner’s nape, card them up into his hair. “Thanks.”</p><p> </p><p>“Could not be happier to help, babe. Anytime. Literally.” A fine shudder runs through Conner when Tim scratches his nails lightly at the base of Conner’s skull, and he grins, scrapes his teeth just under Tim’s jaw so that Tim’s fist tightens in his hair as Tim drags him closer again. “Jesus,” Conner mutters against Tim’s neck, dropping back onto his side next to Tim and looking a little stunned. Tim lets him go, feeling a little smug and much calmer again, the terror quieter now.</p><p> </p><p>As he realizes just how much better he’s feeling, Tim can’t help leaning in one more time, cupping Conner’s jaw and kissing him sweet and soft. They’re both smiling when they pull back, and Tim thinks he would be happy to do this for a long, long time.</p><p> </p><p>Then his stomach growls and Conner cracks up, and Tim considers that maybe a long, long time starts after lunch.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Having Conner this way now—being allowed to sleep in his bed, to press him up against the side of the barn after Tim finishes feeding the chickens in the morning, to curl up with Conner’s back pressed against his chest and his arms wrapped around Conner’s waist as they flip through cable channels at night—is a huge help in managing the renewed anxiety Tim is dealing with.</p><p> </p><p>It’s actually almost embarrassing how easily Conner’s touch can unravel the snarled tension that forms in his body when he’s not paying attention; just the physical reminder that Conner is still here helps, but it’s kind of shocking to Tim how much it also comforts him to feel that he has someone who’s unequivocally on his side. He’s never thought of himself as a lonely person; he has plenty of friends, and his family has grown more than it’s shrunk in the last five or six years, but he’s realizing how much he sometimes has trouble <em>feeling</em> like it. The period after Bruce’s “death” must have taken more of a toll than Tim understood, though, because it’s scarily easy to fall into the sensation that it’s him against the world, so much so that he’s never even noticed how often he feels that way.</p><p> </p><p> But Conner has always, always been on his side, never made him feel abandoned, not when he’s been alive to prevent it. Somehow his touch seems the reminder Tim needs that he can relax, let down his guard, that he’s trusted and cared for and <em>wanted</em>. And yet despite all of the ease and relief that Conner’s presence provides, or maybe because of it, Tim finds lately that he’s feeling a viciously protective instinct that he can’t quite bite back, something he’s not used to having to manage with Conner.</p><p> </p><p>All of which means, naturally, that he’s started walking with Conner on his way to school and meeting him at the edge of town where he and Lori part ways on the trip home. Conner has made copious fun of him for it, joking gently about separation anxiety, but he’s not entirely wrong. It still haunts Tim, the thought of what might have happened if the two Department of Defense agents had caught Conner alone, if no one had known to look for him. It unsettles Tim deeply how Conner might have simply disappeared from his life all over again—Tim would have found him eventually, of course, but <em>what</em>, exactly, he would have found is something Tim has to fight not to let himself think about.</p><p> </p><p>Conner doesn’t seem to mind spending even more time with Tim, though, which is sort of thrilling in and of itself. They’re wandering down Main Street towards the turnoff for the school, Conner’s hands in his pockets and Tim’s arm looped through the crook of his elbow, when someone sticks their head out of a slow-moving car that passes them and tosses what looks like a magazine at Conner.</p><p><br/>
“You’re famous, Kent!” the guy shouts cheerfully as the car drives on, and Conner reaches out to snag the magazine off the ground, holding it up.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh boy,” he says after a second, and Tim shamelessly tucks his head against Conner’s chest to see what’s going on.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Wayne Enterprises CEO Caught In Gay Farmhand Tryst?? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>“Huh,” Tim says, blinking. “I guess that guy finally got something on us that he could sell. Kind of impressive that they managed to implicate Bruce to drum up more interest, too.”</p><p> </p><p>“Why am I just ‘Farmhand’ in this headline?” Conner complains.</p><p> </p><p>“You might be ‘Gay Farmhand’,” Tim offers, then rereads the headline. “Oh, wait, no, they didn’t catch me <em>in</em> you. Sorry, Farmhand.” Conner glares at him, flushing slightly, and Tim smiles pleasantly back before snatching the magazine out of his hands, rifling through it to read the article more thoroughly. Conner sighs and puts a hand on Tim’s hip to keep him from walking into anything or veering off the sidewalk.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Timothy Drake-Wayne, former Wayne Enterprises CEO and current COO of Wayne Enterprises and CEO of Drake Industries, was discovered in Smallville, Kansas last month, just days after adoptive father Bruce Wayne announced Drake-Wayne’s plans to take a jet-setting vacation around the world. The hard-working young executive has undoubtedly earned the time off, but it seems that he kept his true intentions for his “vacation” from his father, who declined to comment. Sources indicated his presence in Smallville as early as the beginning of June, and he’s apparently stayed put since then. </em>
</p><p><em>              And with good reason—our sources have reported repeated sightings of Drake-Wayne getting </em>very<em> cozy with a new beau, a tall, dark-haired young man (right), whom neighbors identified as Conner Kent. Kent is a relation of reporter Clark Kent, and appears to be working on the family farm while completing high school, which sources familiar with Kent say he was forced to withdraw from for several years due to severe illness in his teens. We say good for you, Mr. Kent! </em></p><p>
  <em>              And good for Mr. Drake-Wayne, as well! As you can see, Kent must have recovered admirably from his illness, as photographs show a tall, muscular young man with a jawline to die for. The couple have been spotted repeatedly in the small town, engaging in adorable moments of PDA (above). Fortunately for Drake-Wayne, Kent appears to be a perfect gentleman, opening doors during dates and putting a charmingly country twist on the old classic move by offering his flannels during outings to chilly restaurants. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Well… almost perfect! The two were recently caught in a compromising position after a date (left) before Kent was whisked off in handcuffs by law enforcement, despite Drake-Wayne’s attempts to intervene. We’ve been assured by the county sheriff’s office that it was merely a case of mistaken identity, however. What a way to end the night! We’re glad that the matter was resolved quickly, especially considering the glow on Drake-Wayne’s face when he’s with his new man. We wish Mr. Drake-Wayne and Mr. Kent a more peaceful vacation moving forward! </em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>“Okay, I <em>really </em>need to talk to your neighbors about getting chatty with stray reporters,” Tim mutters, looking up at Conner. “They gave out <em>way</em> too much personal information about you. Why would they even include some of this stuff?” The last question is mostly to himself, and Conner makes a face, shrugging.</p><p> </p><p>“We can talk to the neighbors, but you know how people are here. They think they’re just being friendly. Was it bad?”</p><p> </p><p>“As far as tabloid articles go? Not awful. They did catch you getting arrested, so that’s public knowledge now, but the sheriff claimed it was mistaken identity—could be worse. I don’t like them knowing so much, though. They figured out that you’re related to Clark, and someone told them about you ‘withdrawing’ from school.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner makes a face. “That’s embarrassing. Did they really need to call me out for still being in school?”</p><p> </p><p>“They did congratulate you on it?” Tim says, not sure if that’s better or worse. “And they said you were hot. The pictures of you are pretty good.”</p><p> </p><p>The pictures of Conner are great, actually, even with the glasses and the dweeby hair and most of his better assets concealed under layers of baggy clothing. They must have been following him around for quite a while, but they’ve got shots of him working on the farm, clearly taken from the street, pictures of him laughing with friends, and, of course, plenty of shots of him staring adoringly at Tim.</p><p> </p><p>Now that Tim knows that Conner wasn’t faking anything on their dates, it actually makes him blush, the crowded collages of Conner smiling softly at him, laughing, listening to him talk as they walk hand in hand. He’s sort of perversely grateful to the photographer for giving him this, reframing all of those moments, letting him really see the way Conner has been looking at him all this time. It makes his heart turn over in his chest, his stomach flutter with nerves that should have settled by now, and Conner looks down at him, quirking an eyebrow.</p><p> </p><p>“You okay?”</p><p> </p><p>“Fine,” Tim says, and Conner makes no comment when he doesn’t toss the magazine in one of the trashcans dotted along the street. “This has really made me realize that I look like an absolute goblin when I stand next to you, though. Did you have to get so <em>tall</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Conner grins as they turn into the school, squeezing Tim’s hip where he’s still holding it. “Sorry, bud, I don’t make the rules. I think you’re a very cute goblin? My favorite goblin? Does that help?”</p><p> </p><p>“It does not,” Tim informs him, and Conner gives an “I tried” sort of shrug. They drift to a halt as they approach the school, and the parking lot is basically empty since it’s summer, so Tim presses up on the balls of his feet and hooks his arms around Conner’s neck, dragging him the rest of the way down.</p><p> </p><p>“Tall people,” Tim mutters darkly before their lips meet, soft and easy. Conner is laughing through his nose as he gets his hands on Tim, cupping the back of his head and bracing the arch of his back, and it amazes Tim how it’s a little bit perfect every damn time.</p><p> </p><p>Then Conner’s hands are moving again, slipping to wrap more thoroughly around Tim, and Tim’s feet are lifting off the ground as the angle of the kiss changes, Conner straightening up with Tim in his arms like it’s nothing. It’s kind of interesting, kissing Conner at this angle, Tim’s head actually a few inches above Conner’s now, but not interesting enough that Tim doesn’t knee him in the gut. Conner exhales like he actually felt it and pulls away to laugh into Tim’s collarbone.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” he gasps, and Tim rolls his eyes.</p><p> </p><p>“No, you’re not, you barbarian. Put me down.”</p><p> </p><p>“What, you don’t like being tall?”</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t like being condescended to, asshole,” Tim says, but he can’t make himself sound annoyed enough that Conner stops grinning, and when he taps Conner on the shoulder, Conner sets him back on his feet without further protest.</p><p> </p><p>“See, I would have thought that would be thrilling for you, living out your little goblin dreams,” he says, mild and conversational, and Tim smiles his not-nice smile, eyes narrowing.</p><p> </p><p>“You <em>think</em> you’re funny, but really I win here one way or the other, because ultimately, <em>you’re</em> going to be late for class and I’m not.” Conner blinks at him.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, shit,” he says, and leans down to press one last, quick kiss to Tim’s mouth before jogging off towards the school, leaving Tim smirking in his wake. He feels perfectly satisfied with his life as he turns around to start back towards the farm.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Once he’s sure Conner is safely in school, Tim makes the run back to the Kent farm and spends most of the morning exercising in the barn. He makes use of the farm as best as he can to replicate his usual exercise routines and runs through a few sets of different kinds of practice moves, martial arts and acrobatics, feeling the need to stay on his toes more than he has the entire summer—maybe he’ll ask Conner about sparring later. After finishing up with a pleasant burn tingling in his muscles, just on the verge of real fatigue, he showers and calls Bruce at about noon, figuring that he should be awake and working by then.</p><p> </p><p>“Tim?” Bruce sounds immediately worried, which makes Tim smile a little.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m okay this time, Bruce.”</p><p> </p><p>“Hm. Did you need something?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim stretches out on Conner’s bed, still reveling just a little in the fact that he’s perfectly welcome there now. “I just wanted to ask if you or Babs could follow up about the whole… incident the other day. I’d rather not have to ask, but I don’t know how far I’m going to get trying something like that with the computer at the Smallville library.”</p><p> </p><p>“Maybe further than you’d think,” Bruce says, chuckling. “Of course I’ll look into it. You’re supposed to be on vacation, if I recall correctly.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right. Thanks, Bruce.”</p><p> </p><p>“Happy to help.” There’s a pause, and Tim bites his lip, rolls over onto his side.</p><p> </p><p>“Bruce?”</p><p> </p><p>“Hm?” Tim wonders idly what Bruce is doing. He knows that he might get that same, slightly distracted little hum whether Bruce was reading through Wayne Enterprises paperwork, designing a new Batsuit, or staring out the manor window with a cup of coffee in his hand. It’s Bruce’s way of letting people know that they have his attention without all of the pressure that usually implies, Tim thinks.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m—um. It actually was a date. The other night. I wasn’t sure, but it—it was.”</p><p> </p><p>“…Was it a good date?” <em>That’s</em> not what Tim expects in response, and he blinks at Krypto, who’s laying on the rug of Conner’s room gnawing on some sort of very large bone. He was figuring he’d get uncomfortable silence or awkward, begrudging acceptance, or maybe some displeased grumbling about fraternization and distractions. Paternal interest in Tim’s emotional experience was <em>not</em> on the table in Tim’s mind. Across the room, Krypto cocks his head.</p><p> </p><p>“It was… yeah. Before the interruption, at least. It was really good.”</p><p> </p><p>“Good,” Bruce says, and that seems to be the end of that, but….</p><p> </p><p>“You don’t mind?” Tim blurts, and then wishes he had kept his mouth shut. They had been <em>so</em> close to having a good, normal conversation, but he had to go and give into his damned compulsion to know if Bruce approves of him. It doesn’t even usually make a difference whether he does or not—Tim will do what he thinks he needs to regardless, when it comes down to it—but Tim still can’t seem to help needing to <em>know</em>. There’s a longer pause this time, and Tim picks at a piece of lint on Conner’s blanket, trying to be patient.</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t mind,” Bruce says finally, tone oddly careful. “I’ll worry a little, because that’s what parents do. But if it makes you happy, then I don’t mind.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim exhales through his nose, controlled and even. He hadn’t known how much he wanted to hear that, but he struggles to speak for a minute, and his voice comes out too low when he manages. Krypto stands up and wanders over, hops up on the bed and flops down next to Tim even though he’s not allowed. Tim reaches out and Krypto wiggles closer, lets Tim tuck an arm around him. “Okay.”</p><p> </p><p>“You deserve something that makes you happy, Tim. I know our lifestyle makes it difficult, but… hold onto it if you can.”</p><p> </p><p>“I will,” Tim says, his voice still rough, his lungs not quite cooperating. This conversation is <em>way</em> more than he had bargained for when he'd made this call, but he thinks he’s glad he did. “Bruce?”</p><p> </p><p>“Mm?”</p><p> </p><p>“Um. I love you.”</p><p> </p><p>“…I love you, too.” Tim can hear the little smile in Bruce’s voice, and as he buries his face in Krypto’s fur, he thinks maybe it’s not so bad needing Bruce’s help with this, after all.</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim’s nineteenth birthday is quiet, which is kind of nice. He wakes up early, curled in Conner’s arms—pretty much the best way to start any day—and lets himself be kissed <em>very </em>thoroughly for a good long while until Conner hears Ma calling from downstairs. Tim makes a reluctant face, still breathing hard and not quite willing to let Conner go, but Conner kisses him one more time and grins at him.</p><p> </p><p>“Come on, birthday boy. Pretty sure I smell pancakes down there, and I’m happy to admit that Ma’s pancakes are better than making out with me.” Tim snorts and eyes him skeptically, but gets his hands out from under Conner’s shirt, stretches, and sits up.</p><p> </p><p>“Not that I doubt Ma, but these had better be <em>really</em> good pancakes.”</p><p> </p><p>As much as Tim hates to admit that Conner was right, they are, in fact, extremely good pancakes, possibly even better than Alfred’s. He walks Conner into town after breakfast (weekday birthdays are truly the worst), and follows his usual routine, running back and working out for several hours before heading back into the house to crochet and chat with Ma for a while.</p><p> </p><p>In the early afternoon he starts getting a stream of texts from his family and friends—the Young Justice group chat had started pinging earlier as he had walked Conner to school, and now his family is waking up. Alfred actually calls, and they chat for a while, catching up before Alfred hands the phone to Bruce. Dick, Steph, and Cass send a variety of emoji-laden texts with variations on “happy birthday”—no exclamation points from Cass, lots of cake and heart emojis; a <em>lot</em> of exclamation points from Steph along with an indecipherable block of seemingly random emojis; a moderate number of exclamation points from Dick, along with a promise to hang out once Tim gets back and several texts’ worth of only slightly ironic sparkle-heart emojis. Even Damian sends him a message congratulating him on failing to die again this year, which is strangely touching, although Tim is sure Dick had some hand in it.</p><p> </p><p>He realizes in the midst of all of it just how much he misses his family. It’s been easy to stay caught up in his own little world here, busy worrying about his crush or the break-ins or Lex Luthor, but he misses having his siblings to hang out with, people who more often than not understand him without a word, Alfred to lean on when he can’t quite take care of himself. There are things he’s starting to realize that he hasn’t quite let go of, the distance revealing wounds he didn’t know he had, but there’s still something effortless about Gotham, his family, a way he fits there that Smallville will never replicate.</p><p> </p><p>It’s nice to spend a couple of hours bouncing texts back and forth with his siblings, even Damian’s biting, grammatically-correct insults, and he’s feeling grounded and cheerful when Conner gets back from school. He’d texted Tim that Lori and Sujan were coming back with him so Tim didn’t need to meet him, but they’re running late and lowering their voices more the closer they get to the porch where Tim has been curled up on the swing, enjoying the unseasonably mild afternoon at Ma’s suggestion. Tim is immediately suspicious.</p><p> </p><p>“What, we’re not allowed to come say happy birthday?” Lori demands when she sees the look on his face, crosses her arms over her chest.</p><p> </p><p>“You, I trust,” Tim tells her, mimicking her gesture and shooting a look at Conner. “Him, not so much. He’s making the face he makes when he thinks he’s being sneaky.”</p><p> </p><p>“I don’t have a sneaky face,” Conner says, frowning, and Sujan laughs. “What?”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ve seen the face,” Sujan says, apologetic but grinning.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s actually mostly the reason why you’re bad at being sneaky. The teachers can always tell when you’re texting in class, they just don’t bother calling you out because you’re quiet about it,” Lori informs him, and Conner makes an exasperated noise and herds them back off the porch, reaching back to snag Tim’s hand and tug him along with them.</p><p> </p><p>“All of you are terrible,” he says, and Lori laughs as she leads the way down the little dirt path that leads towards the water tower. When they reach the far side of it, facing away from the road, Conner picks each of them up and floats them to the top, depositing them one by one. There’s already a stash of beach towels they’ve left up top, anchored by a sizeable rock, to protect their legs from the scorching heat of the metal that’s been baking all day in the Kansas summer, and Lori and Sujan have them spread out by the time Conner sets Tim down.</p><p> </p><p>They sit up there for a while—Krypto flies out to join them after a bit, and Lori takes up petting him enthusiastically, ruffling his ears and baby-talking him while Tim and Sujan chat. Conner lays down and stretches out, closing his eyes and looking utterly content to soak up the early evening sunshine. Tim is deeply grateful that Sujan is too polite to call him on the way he keeps getting a little distracted, pausing mid-sentence or nearly losing the thread of the conversation whenever he glances down at Conner and notices the way the soft yellow glow of the sun catches on his cheekbones and eyelids, washes his lips and eyelashes golden. He can’t quite keep his hands to himself, lets himself reach out to stroke his fingertips lightly along the inside of Conner’s forearm where Conner’s thrown it out near Tim’s thigh, and when he glances back up, Sujan is smiling broadly at him, radiating happiness.</p><p> </p><p>Eventually, Conner and Krypto’s heads both perk up in response to some sounds inaudible to human ears, and Conner sits up, stretching again before standing up and reaching down to pull Tim to his feet.</p><p> </p><p>“That was Ma calling,” he explains as Krypto takes off towards the house. “Supper’s ready.”</p><p> </p><p>“’Supper’,” Tim mutters, but knows better than to start in on Conner about it now. One way or the other, it means Ma’s food, and he’s not about to distract Conner from getting them down off the tower by making fun of his conversion to full farm boy status. Tim helps Sujan pack away the towels as Conner gets Lori back on the ground, and Sujan hangs back with Tim once they’re all headed back towards the house.</p><p> </p><p>“You’ve figured things out with Conner?” Sujan asks him, voice low, phrasing the question delicately. Tim flushes anyway, bites the inside of his cheek to keep himself from fidgeting.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” he says, and Sujan gives him that bright, joyful smile again, reaching out to touch Tim’s shoulder briefly.</p><p> </p><p>“I am very glad. In my time, you went down in history not only for your individual heroism, but also as a rather famously dedicated couple. I was concerned that my presence might have altered things for you somehow, so I am happy that it all worked out.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Tim says, blinking at Sujan as his heart trips in his chest. He hasn’t thought anywhere close to that far ahead, isn’t even thinking about the end of the summer yet, so that bit of future trivia catches him off-guard. It’s nice to know that he doesn’t end up some lonely hermit after all, of course, but the idea that Conner could really like him <em>that much </em>is still enough to make his brain stutter to a halt. Glancing over at Conner, he can see a slow flush creeping up the back of his neck, the tips of his ears turning pink—Tim is pretty sure it has nothing to do with Lori’s complaining about some annoying guy at school.</p><p> </p><p>When they get back to the house, Ma has dinner ready, and now it’s Tim’s turn to blush for an entirely different reason—there’s a little “Happy Birthday” banner strung up in the kitchen doorway, and she’s got a variety of Tim’s favorite dishes laid out on the table, surely based on intel from Alfred. She smiles warmly at him as he stares around the kitchen, takes in the little clusters of balloons tied to the backs of two chairs. “I thought a treat might be in order,” is all she says, and Tim has to step forward and hug her.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Ma,” he says into her shoulder, squeezing her lightly before stepping back. “You didn’t have to.”</p><p> </p><p>“Of course not,” she says, shooing him towards a chair. “I wanted to. It’s been lovely having you around the house, and you’re missing spending today with your family, so I thought it was only right that I put a little something together for you.”</p><p> </p><p>His birthday is—well, it was such a non-event in his childhood that it had taken him a minute to actually remember what day it was when Alfred had first asked years ago, and even now, the day itself tends to be pretty laid back. He’d gotten a big party at Titans Tower the weekend before or after for a couple of years before things started to fall apart, although that had been more for the others than for him. Alfred will usually bake him something, and he gets some combination of hugs and gifts from his siblings, but it’s rare that he gets a normal party like this, one that’s truly just about being happy that he’s around. Everyone is smiling at him, and he clears his throat, smiles back.</p><p> </p><p>“This is really nice,” he says, and means it. Ma pats his shoulder as she starts serving, and Conner reaches over to tangle their fingers together under the table. The dinner is delicious, and there’s a homemade cake and ice cream afterwards, and Tim’s not sure he’s ever felt so much like a normal person in his life.</p><p> </p><p>A little after seven, Ma glances at the clock and makes a surprised face. “Oh my,” she says, “I wasn’t even looking at the time! I promised Suzanne that I would drop by after supper. I’ll just get this cleaned up.” She pushes back from the table and starts moving dishes to the sink.</p><p> </p><p>“Um, I can get those,” Conner says, rising from the table and frowning at her. He looks confused, but she just smiles brightly at him and pats him on the cheek.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, would you, dear? That would be lovely. I don’t want to keep Suzie waiting.” Tim catches Lori and Sujan sharing a glance, and remembers too late to catch what they might be communicating that they’re both actual damned telepaths.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, I actually need to be heading back,” Lori says, getting up and putting her dishes in the sink. “My mom will need me soon.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll walk you back,” Sujan offers, and she smiles at him.</p><p> </p><p>“Happy birthday, Tim,” Lori adds, Sujan echoing her as they begin drifting towards the front door. Tim follows them, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow, but they both just keep smiling their way out the door. Ma follows them shortly, pulling her handbag over her shoulder and stopping to kiss Conner on the cheek as he finishes clearing the platters from the table and stowing the leftovers.</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll be back in a few hours, boys. No need to wait up for me—enjoy the rest of your birthday, Tim,” she says, and he bites the tip of his tongue, trying not to read anything into that.</p><p> </p><p>“Thanks, Ma. Have a good visit,” he says, and leans in the doorway of the kitchen until the door closes behind her and he hears her heading down the porch stairs. When the truck roars to life outside, he turns to Conner, who’s still looking confused, and bursts into laughter.</p><p> </p><p>“What’s so funny?” Conner asks, smiling as he makes his way closer to Tim.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh my god, you didn’t catch that?” Tim asks, breathy as he tries to contain his mirth. Conner just looks at him, and Tim tips forward, leaning his forehead against Conner’s chest. “They all left on purpose to give us the house to ourselves, Conner. They weren’t even trying to be subtle, holy shit.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Conner says, and when Tim looks up, Conner meets his eyes, looking just a touch nervous as pink begins to stain his cheeks. “Well, um. Since they did, you wanna take advantage?”</p><p> </p><p>Grinning, Tim wraps his arms around Conner’s neck and doesn’t let go.</p><p> </p><p>
  <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27171112">*</a>
</p><p> </p><p>A few days later, Tim’s phone goes off as he’s out weeding the vegetable garden for Ma. Fishing it out of his back pocket, he sees the name flashing on his caller ID and tugs his gloves off as quickly as he can, sitting back in the dirt as he picks up.   </p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Bruce. What’s up?”</p><p> </p><p>“Tim,” Bruce says, and Tim immediately doesn’t like his tone. It’s serious, bordering on Batty, and Tim wipes the sweat off his forehead, trying to keep his shoulders relaxed. “There’s been a… development, regarding Conner's incident the other week.”</p><p> </p><p>“O…kay? What did you find?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not much, actually. But I just received a call from Damian's mother.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim's pretty sure he feels his stomach hit the dirt. Talia showing up is never good, and it’s even worse if her plans somehow involve <em>Conner,</em> of all people. “What? <em>Seriously</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>“I’m afraid so,” Bruce says, sounding genuinely troubled. “She didn’t divulge many details, but she did ask me to pass along to you that she regrets her involvement in nearly depriving you of your… 'beloved'. Apparently she saw the tabloid article that came out recently, and your relationship status made her change her mind about whatever her father is up to.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, that's great,” Tim mutters, glaring at nothing and stabbing the dirt next to him furiously and repeatedly with the weeding fork. “When it's just my <em>best friend</em>, sure, fine, abduct him, murder him, no big deal. But if it's <em>romantic</em>? My <em>boyfriend</em>? <em>Then</em> suddenly she's squeamish. Of course.”</p><p> </p><p>“She’s… not great at boundaries,” Bruce says, more delicately than Tim thinks she deserves. He's not feeling generous. “She understands family loyalty, and… at least <em>values</em> romantic love, but I don’t think she's ever really had friends. I don’t know that she entirely understood how deeply her father's plan would have hurt you until she realized the nature of your relationship.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right, because she cares that it would have <em>hurt</em> me. Let's be honest—she’s projecting her own issues onto me. Her loyalty to her father has deprived her of her own romantic interest, so this is her way of rebelling.”</p><p> </p><p>“That's another way of looking at it,” Bruce says, and Tim sighs, lets go of his stabbing implement in favor of burying his face in his hand and pushing his fingers through his hair.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>“Well, at least it’s some direction,” he says, grudgingly trying to find an upside. He’s spending too much time with Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“Yes, knowing who’s behind it is helpful. Now I just need to figure out what exactly he’s doing, and what we need to do to stop him.”</p><p> </p><p>“…This is really bad, Bruce. It’s one thing if he’s coming after me, but what the hell does he want with Conner?” It comes out soft, worried, and Bruce hums quietly on the other end of the line.</p><p> </p><p>“It does seem odd. It’s not as if Smallville is beyond his reach, but it rarely ends well when he sets his sights on someone like Conner. I’ll keep a close eye on the situation.”</p><p> </p><p>“Right.” There’s a long pause. It’s not unusual for the two of them—they both live in their own heads, both understand how long it can take to filter instinct or emotion through into something communicable. “I can’t believe I’m just going to sit around here weeding the garden while all of this is happening. How do regular people do this?”</p><p> </p><p>Bruce chuckles. “Regular people don’t know the things you do, Tim. Do you… want to come home? You know you’re welcome back at any time.”</p><p> </p><p>“I….” Tim has to stop and think about it. The immediate impulse is <em>yes</em>, to go back, dig in, protect what’s his at any cost. He knows that Ra’s would be more than happy to destroy his life, anyone and anything in it, and there’s a fierce desire to get as far out in front of Ra’s as he can, meet him on the most equal ground possible. Ra’s could be getting ready to throw just about anything at them, and it’s hard to see that black cloud on the horizon and not already be in motion.</p><p> </p><p>At the same time, though, there’s a pull just as strong rooting him right here—being with Ma and Conner, getting to know Smallville, it’s making him <em>happy</em>, and even if it would be for all the right reasons, it’s a hard ask to give that up early. The happiness he has here isn’t the familiar exhilaration of his night job, not the wild thrill of swinging over rooftops and stretching his mind and body to their limits with singular purpose. It’s not the satisfaction of putting away criminals or snatching up resources for a good cause in the boardroom, or even the relief and gratitude he feels every time his family all make it home safe. It’s a warm, easy sort of happiness, a kind of good that doesn’t come with the price tag of broken bones and lost lives, the eternal taste of blood between his teeth. He likes it more than he ever would have thought he could.</p><p> </p><p>“Why don’t I take care of it for now?” Bruce suggests, his tone edging towards gentle when Tim fails to respond. “If I find something big enough that I need backup, I’ll call you immediately.”</p><p> </p><p>“Alright,” Tim says, and tries not to feel defeated by it, like he’s failing somehow. It’s a good thing, he tries to convince himself, that he doesn’t have to do it all himself, doesn’t need to be constantly guarding against any and every possibility. Letting Bruce and the family have his back on this doesn’t mean he can’t handle it—having friends just means he doesn’t always <em>have</em> to. The little voice in his head telling him that sounds suspiciously like Conner, which gives Tim a warm little feeling that he decides not to think too hard about. “Thank you, Bruce. I know you’re already stretched thinner than usual just so I can be here, so I… I really appreciate you taking this on for me.”</p><p> </p><p>“If it makes you feel any better, you can tell yourself that I’m just engaging in my usual risk-mitigation strategies,” Bruce tells him dryly. “You and Conner are valuable resources, neutralizing threats, so on and so forth. Or you can tell yourself that I’m happy to look out for my son. You hardly ever need my help anymore.”</p><p> </p><p>If Bruce were anyone else, Tim would have thought that last statement sounded <em>wistful</em>. “That’s a good thing.”</p><p> </p><p>“It is,” Bruce agrees. “But I still don’t mind when you do. I’ll get back in touch when I have more to go on.”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay. Talk to you soon.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The plot thickens??</p><p>Anyway I had to finally decide how I'd mangled the timeline while I was writing this and I think basically what I did was nudge Conner's death closer to the two-year mark and place most of the events of Conner's Adventure Comics and Superboy runs after Red Robin instead of being concurrent (in my head they made him wait a while to re-enroll in school bc he got revived mid-second semester and had to wait for the fall lol). Also, does it super duper bug anybody else that Tim is apparently supposed to be 17 THE WHOLE TIME in Red Robin?? It makes no sense to me, I reject it</p><p>Also-also, thanks so much to everyone who's been sticking with me, I'm so so sorry about not getting to all of the comments from last chapter, I promise I'll go back and answer soon!! I am just. So exhausted all the time lmao it was answering comments or writing and I figured yall would want another chapter, but I love you so much if you commented, thank you from the bottom of my heart!!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Chapter 13</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello! I'm kind of nervous because this chapter is kind of different from the others, but I actually don't have much to say here except to warn that I am adding the 'canon-typical violence' tag now, so... be aware! Enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When Tim’s phone lights up with Babs’ name, he’s not sure if he’s worried or relieved. It’s been nearly three weeks since he had initially called her, and he doesn’t want to rush her, but the silence has been eating at him.</p><p> </p><p>“Hey, Babs. What’s up?” He keeps his tone as neutral as he can, but it’s a hard fight not to tense his shoulders when Babs sighs tightly.</p><p> </p><p>“Not much, unfortunately. I wanted to get back in touch. I haven’t forgotten about you, but there were some issues with the Birds, and I haven’t made much progress on your LexCorp stuff.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh,” Tim says, keeps the disappointment and worry out of his voice. “That’s okay, I know you’re busy.”</p><p> </p><p>“It’s not just that,” Babs says, and he can picture her shaking her head, tight-lipped and unhappy. “I haven’t had <em>much</em> time to work on it, but the time I <em>have</em> had should have done the trick. They’re running really heavy defense on some of this stuff, Tim. Every time I’ve started to find a thread of something related to Valentine’s research anywhere deeper than their most basic corporate servers, I move to dig another layer down, and suddenly it’s gone. I think they might have something or someone bouncing things around deliberately to make it harder for anyone to get their hands on.”</p><p> </p><p>“Shit,” Tim says, and that’s about all he’s got. In his ear, Babs snorts.</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah. Even some of their other ‘undercover’ stuff isn’t as hard to get at as this. I got into the channels where they kept the weird shit—communications on getting Lex back into power, proposals for some of the skeeviest mergers I’ve ever seen, even research that seriously looks like they’re trying to develop anti-Superman tech that’s not reliant on Kryptonite. But <em>this</em>? I’ve got nothing. I don’t know exactly what that means, but I seriously doubt it’s going to be anything good.”  </p><p> </p><p>“Right. Well, could you maybe keep trying if you have any spare time? <em>Anything</em> that would give me an idea of what we might be up against, or at least, when to expect it, would be great.”</p><p> </p><p>“I’ll do what I can. Keep a close eye on your boyfriend though, okay?” Tim makes sort of a choking noise at the word “boyfriend”—he hasn’t been hiding it, of course, and he knows that most of the family are aware by now, but somehow hearing it out of Barbara’s mouth is jarring, makes it feel weirdly <em>real</em> in a way that it hasn’t yet. Babs’ word is law, so if she’s acknowledging it, he’s clearly not dreaming. Ignoring the undignified sounds Tim is making, she continues. “Not that subtlety is usually Lex’s hallmark, but you never know. You’re going to want to keep an eye out for any unusual changes in behavior until I can be sure that they’re not ready to put anything into action yet, okay?”</p><p> </p><p>“Right, of course,” Tim manages as he recovers. “If anyone starts acting weird, I’ll try to let you know.”</p><p> </p><p>“Good plan,” she says, in the tone that means she’s moving on to other concerns, probably about to hang up on him. “Anything happens, I’ll nuke their systems from orbit.”</p><p> </p><p>That gets a laugh out of him. “Thanks, Babs.”</p><p> </p><p>“Anytime, kid. Stay safe.”</p><p> </p><p>*</p><p> </p><p>Tim and Conner are having an especially lazy weekend—there’s been a heatwave, which is <em>really</em> saying something in Kansas in July, Tim is discovering. It'd gotten so bad in the middle of the night that Tim had actually voluntarily moved back to the air mattress, unable to tolerate skin-to-skin contact with <em>anyone,</em> much less Conner, who Tim suspects will double nicely as a space heater in winter. In light of the weather conditions, Tim has spent most of Saturday and the better part of Sunday morning laying on the hardwood floor of Conner’s room in front of a large box fan and praying for death, and Conner is obligingly keeping him company even though he doesn’t seem particularly bothered by the heat, the Kryptonian bastard.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re not allowed to have a heat stroke on my floor, you know,” Conner says, looking up from the notes he’s reviewing as Tim groans and rolls over, trying to find a section of the floor that’s not already warm from his skin but still in the path of the fan’s breeze.</p><p> </p><p>“If you’re not going to do anything useful, can you shut up? You talking is making me hotter.”</p><p> </p><p>“Aww,” Conner says, and there’s a note in his voice that Tim does <em>not </em>trust. “I wasn’t even trying. Is it just the sound of my voice, babe?”</p><p> </p><p>When Tim looks over he’s grinning wickedly where he sits on the bed, rolling his pencil between his fingers, and Tim flops gracelessly over again, sacrificing his newfound cool spot in favor of mashing his burning face into the floor. He’s still not sure if he loves or hates how openly Conner flirts with him now—it’s a silly sort of thrilling, but also kind of humiliating how easily he reacts every time. “I hate you so much,” Tim mutters into the floor.</p><p> </p><p>Conner laughs, and Tim can’t see what he’s doing exactly, but there’s a lot of rustling and the sound of footsteps, and the room falls blessedly silent. Tim closes his eyes, breathing slowly and staying as still as he can, trying not to do anything that would make him hotter. The air conditioning in the Kent house is a little on the old and rickety side, and even going at full blast, the ambient heat and humidity are enough to make Tim feel sticky and stifled.</p><p> </p><p>The footsteps make a comeback after a few minutes, and something makes a gentle clicking sound next to Tim’s head. He feels Conner press a kiss into his hair, the only part of Tim’s head he can really get at from this angle, and it sends a little shiver of happiness down Tim’s spine for the fact that Conner is allowed to do that now and Tim is allowed to <em>enjoy </em>it. When he opens his eyes, there’s a glass of lemonade sitting on the floor in front of him, brimming with ice and already starting to sweat.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, I take it back,” Tim says, sitting up and reaching for the glass. “Maybe I like you a little bit.”</p><p> </p><p>The morning drifts by slow and easy; Conner half-heartedly studies for a test, and Tim revels in the strange sensation of doing absolutely nothing, enjoys the companionable silences and alternately encourages and threatens Conner when he starts to get too off-task. Sometime shortly after lunch, Lori and Sujan come over to commiserate about the heat—Lori quickly joins Tim in sprawling out on Conner’s floor, and Sujan sits with his arms wrapped around his knees, smiling as Lori laments having been born in such a god-forsaken town.</p><p> </p><p>“Seriously, this <em>must</em> be hell, right? That’s the only explanation—it’s hot as fuck, <em>boring</em> as fuck, and the only time it’s <em>not</em> boring is when a crime is being committed. Isn’t that like, the definition of hell?”</p><p> </p><p>“As I recall, you’ve been responsible for a couple of those crimes yourself,” Conner points out, rolling his shoulders and leaning back against the foot of his bed. “So, if we’re going by your theory, it kinda makes sense that you’re stuck here?”</p><p> </p><p>“Okay, what’s <em>your</em> excuse then, boy scout?” Lori asks, glaring at him. “Or Tim and Sujan, for that matter.”</p><p> </p><p>“Tim and I <em>definitely</em> deserve to be here,” Conner tells her, grinning. “I know you’ve looked up clips of me when I was younger online, you saw what a little shit I was. I disagree with your premise, but if Smallville is supposedly hell, it kind of makes perfect sense that I ended up here. And Tim is from New Jersey.”</p><p> </p><p>“Hey,” Tim says, half-hearted. Conner looks like he’s about to start in on Tim, gets that merciless grin on his face that makes Tim’s stomach twist embarrassingly with excitement, but his phone buzzing in his pocket interrupts him. He’s still eyeing Tim like he’s not done yet, but he leaves off long enough to pull it out of his pocket, and in the space of seconds he goes from smirking to frowning at the screen in a way that puts Tim instantly on edge.</p><p> </p><p>“Is everything alright?” Sujan asks—it’s obvious that Conner is unhappy about something, but with Sujan’s sensitivities, Tim imagines it must feel like he could cut the tension in the air with a knife, stress and discomfort radiating off of Conner in waves. Conner just frowns harder, looks up at Tim with the sort of seriousness that Tim rarely sees outside of emergency Titans meetings. He holds his phone up to Tim, who squints to read it. He feels his stomach drop at the message on the screen.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Simon</strong>
</p><p>
  <em>hey, are you busy? have something to show you. meet me by mrs o’neil’s old farm?</em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>“…Is he asking you to meet him at an abandoned farm in the middle of nowhere?” Tim asks finally, and Conner nods, looking distressed.</p><p> </p><p>“Who is?” Lori asks, leaning past Tim to try to get a look at the phone. Tim and Conner exchange looks, but Conner shrugs, and Tim leaves it up to him—from some of the stories he’s heard, Lori and Sujan have seen their fair share of Conner’s less conventional adventures, and if he trusts them, Tim will, too.</p><p> </p><p>“Simon,” Conner tells her, and her face immediately crumples into suspicion.</p><p> </p><p>“The little weirdo wants you to meet him out in some abandoned field by that creepy old house? Isn’t he still supposed to be interning for that asshole in Metropolis? Bad idea. Tell him you’re busy,” Lori says, glaring at Conner’s phone like it’s personally victimized her. Tim suddenly feels a deep fondness for her.</p><p> </p><p>Conner looks to Tim, who nods his agreement, and then taps at his phone for a minute. It buzzes seconds later, and Conner’s shoulders start to creep up towards his ears the way they do when he’s stressed.</p><p> </p><p>“What did he say?” Tim asks, not liking how this is going already.</p><p> </p><p>“He wants to know when I <em>can</em> meet him,” Conner says. His expression clearly reads <em>help me</em>, and Tim grits his teeth. He wants to have an easy solution, <em>does</em> have an easy solution, but Conner has trouble giving up on people. Tim can tell from the set of his jaw that Conner isn’t going to be able to walk away from this problem.</p><p> </p><p>“This is going to be bad,” Tim tells Conner. It’s honest, but he kind of feels bad about the way it makes Conner’s mouth twist, frustrated and upset.</p><p> </p><p>“I know, but… you know what Sujan told us,” Conner says. Lori glances between the three of them, confused, but no one stops to explain. “We’re already friends, you know? It’s not like brushing off a stranger. What if… what if me ignoring him, rejecting his science stuff, is part of what sends him down that path? Whatever this ends up being, can it be worse than <em>that</em>?”</p><p> </p><p>Tim almost wants to laugh at “science stuff”, but as much as he hates to admit it, Conner is raising a valid concern. From the little he’s seen, Simon strikes Tim as the type who, given the wrong incentive, could easily be pushed into something far more dangerous than playing around with making frogs obey him. It’s even worse that he’s apparently plenty capable even at his age, and in the middle of nowhere in Smallville, to boot. Adding Luthor’s influence and resources into the mix and removing Conner as a source of companionship and emotional support only compromises the situation further, and Tim cringes to think of the sort of action that Simon could be spurred to. The last thing anyone needs is Lex grooming a biotech genius as a successor in his deranged battle against anything Kryptonian. On the other hand….</p><p> </p><p>“Conner, this could be <em>really</em> dangerous. You know that, right? Obviously Simon becoming what he did is awful, but setting aside the personal cost, there’s a very real possibility that the outcome for humanity could be even <em>worse</em> if this….”</p><p> </p><p>He can’t quite bring himself to say it, and the pain in Conner’s face mirrors the sensation in Tim’s gut at the thought. It’s suddenly a horrifically real possibility that he could lose Conner all over again, and he’s fighting waves of nausea, struggling to breathe as the possibilities of Simon’s request wash over him. It had been easier to reconcile the thought of Simon killing <em>him</em> someday than it is to consider the possibility of Conner dying again to prevent it.</p><p> </p><p>Sujan reaches out to touch Tim’s shoulder, and a wave of calm washes over him—the panic is still there, just under the surface, because Tim knows by now that Sujan would never rob a person of their feelings. Instead, what Sujan gives him is the peace he can’t make himself find right now, enough space to catch his breath, get himself thinking straight again. After a minute he swallows and nods at Sujan, grateful, and Sujan smiles, just a little worried around the edges. When Tim forces himself to look back to Conner, he immediately wishes he hadn’t, clings to the artificial calm that’s still lingering in his mind when he sees the look in Conner’s eyes—anguish, sorrow, <em>fear</em>, and it’s too much to take, almost pushes Tim right back over the edge.</p><p> </p><p>“I think I have to, Tim,” Conner says, soft and sorry. Tim doesn’t want Conner to be looking at him like that, <em>sounding</em> like that for him, not when Conner’s the one who’s about to step out to meet several of his worst fears head-on, all bundled up in the neat little package of someone who’s supposed to be a friend.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Tim says, breathing deeply through his nose. “Then I’ll go with you.”</p><p> </p><p>The relief that flashes across Conner’s face makes Tim’s chest fill with warmth, but it only lasts for a second before Conner is back to looking worried, gnawing on his bottom lip in a way that he only does when things are really bad. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea, babe. I mean, I would always rather have you with me, you know I trust your judgment, but….”</p><p> </p><p>It’s somehow easier to set aside his own fear in the face of Conner’s, and Tim pushes himself onto his knees, crawls forward until he can settle next to Conner as Lori scoots over to make room for him. Grabbing Conner’s hands and holding them in his lap, Tim leans in until Conner meets his eyes.</p><p> </p><p>“If you trust me, you trust me even when you’re scared,” Tim tells him, soft but unwavering. “I know it’s not easy—you <em>know</em> that I know. But if I’m trusting you to go out there, then I need you to trust me to come with you.”</p><p> </p><p>“If I’m not in control, Tim, if….” Conner trails off, staring at Tim, wide-eyed and pale. His hand drifts up Tim’s wrist, his fingers wrapping around Tim’s forearm. His hand is big enough that his fingers nearly meet, but the press and slide of his thumb up and down the inside of Tim’s forearm is so careful that Tim’s chest goes tight with it, and Tim shakes his head, presses his lips together. Conner’s voice is barely a whisper. “I can’t do that again.”</p><p> </p><p>“You won’t,” Tim says, fierce and sure. Shaking Conner’s hand off, he grabs it with his own again, squeezes tightly. “If you’re not in control, I will be. I’m better than I was—it’s not going to be a problem, and I <em>am</em> coming with you.”</p><p> </p><p>“We all are,” Lori says firmly, and Conner starts shaking his head, but Lori just rolls her eyes, ignores him. “If Simon’s out there with some mind-control ray or whatever, don’t you think you’re going to want the two empaths in town to go with you? Besides, if this is what I think it is, I’m gonna kick that little creep’s ass. Can’t do that from your grandma’s house.”</p><p> </p><p>Conner just stares at them all for a long minute, eyes flicking between Tim’s intent gaze, Lori’s unimpressed frown, and Sujan’s encouraging smile.</p><p> </p><p>“…Guess I’m not gonna win this one,” he says after a minute, and Tim lets a tight smile break across his lips, shakes his head.</p><p> </p><p>“When do you <em>ever </em>win with us?” That gets an unhappy little chuckle out of Conner.</p><p> </p><p>“I guess that’s true. So… is there anything we need to take care of first, or can we just go get this over with? I don’t really want this hanging over my head.”</p><p> </p><p>“How far is it to this farm?” Tim asks, buying himself time to think about any precautions they might be able to take—options are unfortunately pretty limited around here.</p><p> </p><p>He has no gear, precious little in the way of tech. They <em>could</em> try to call in backup, but if they turn out to be wrong about what’s going on here, it’s entirely possible that the display of distrust will have exactly the sort of negative impact on Simon they’re hoping to avoid. Besides, there are precious few heroes around who could really take Conner in a fight, at least without getting kryptonite involved, and Tim is pretty sure they’ve all had more than their fair share of kryptonite for the summer. Showing up with Wonder Woman or Superman in tow for no apparent reason would be excessively suspicious, and Tim sort of cringes to think what the JL members would say after Conner’s last run-in with mind control, anyway.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s maybe… half an hour’s walk?” Conner is saying, tipping his head back and forth uncertainly.</p><p> </p><p>“Okay,” Tim says, making up his mind. “Tell him we’ll meet him in an hour. I can’t think of much that we can do to minimize the potential problems without risking making the whole thing even worse, so we might as well get it over with.”</p><p> </p><p>He glances around, but everyone just nods, looking varying levels of apprehensive. Tim desperately wishes there were more he could do, but he takes the time they have to talk to Sujan and Lori about what they might be able to do to help. It’s hard to give them instructions on what to do beyond being prepared to use their empathic powers if they need to—he might know all about <em>their</em> powers, but Lori, at least, still doesn’t know who he is, and as much as he likes her and wants her on their side in a situation like this, he’s still not quite ready to hand that kind of information over to just anybody.</p><p> </p><p>So he keeps it to a minimum—keep an eye on Conner, be ready for a fight, here’s how you throw a punch without breaking your hand. The half hour they have to spare passes too quickly, and then they’re heading out, walking in heavy silence.</p><p> </p><p>“God,” Lori mutters eventually. “They <em>would</em> pick the hottest day of the fucking year to demand we meet them out in the middle of a <em>field</em>. Couldn’t even have picked a place with some damned trees, much less <em>air conditioning</em>.”</p><p> </p><p>Tim snorts a laugh and it sort of breaks the tension, and Tim doesn’t object when Conner reaches over to take his hand. He walks a little closer, their shoulders brushing occasionally, and strokes his thumb along the side of Kon’s hand as best he can—it’s a move Conner likes to pull on him, and Tim has always found it equal parts comforting and distracting, which is about the best he can hope to do for Conner right now.</p><p> </p><p>Eventually they crest a slight hill, and Tim spots the dilapidated roof of a rickety-looking old barn. There are a number of broken fences, simple wooden affairs that have been left to rot in the elements, and a small farmhouse that’s definitely seen better days.</p><p> </p><p>“Ditch the glasses and the flannel,” Tim says, using his grip on Conner’s hand to tug him to a halt as the abandoned farm comes into view. Simon hasn’t come alone, after all—there’s that shock of red hair, Simon gesturing emphatically at two cows that are grazing in the overgrown yard, and he’s talking to a nondescript sort of woman who’s hunched over two laptops she has set up on a folding table, nodding absently. Different equipment is scattered around the yard; Tim spies an antennae and what look like a handful of grounded drones, all plugged into some sort of power bank along with the laptops. There’s a person Tim pegs as an assistant fiddling with one of the drones, and a handful of security-types hanging around the yard and the old porch. At the center of the loose gaggle of black suits, Tim spots a shiny, bald head that he would recognize anywhere.</p><p> </p><p>“Fuck,” Conner mutters, stopping to strip his flannel off. Lori takes it and ties it around her waist, narrowed eyes trained on Lex’s distant figure as she yanks the sleeves into a knot, and Tim plucks Conner’s glasses off his face and tucks them in his back pocket, hoping they’ll be safe there. Then, on impulse, Tim catches the collar of that familiar black t-shirt in his fist and drags Conner down, kissing him hard and fierce. Conner grabs him, reels Tim in as close as he can get him, hands curling in the back of Tim’s shirt, and it’s sort of comforting to know that Tim isn’t the only one who needs this, wants this one last, good memory just in case.</p><p> </p><p>Tim makes sure to kiss Conner thoroughly, taking his own sweet time about it—if Lex Luthor is about to try to kill Conner or use him as a pawn in some shitty evil plot, Tim’s damned well going to make him do it on <em>their</em> time, and even if it’s just Simon, he’s not too worried about keeping him waiting. What actually makes him pull back, after what’s probably longer than strictly appropriate, is the sound of Lori’s boots shuffling in the grass on the side of the road, tugging him back down to earth. He looks Conner in the eyes for a minute, sits with Conner in the fear and anger and affection he can read in the lines at the corners of Conner’s eyes, between his brows. It seems to help, because he can feel Conner’s muscles loosening slightly under his fingers, relaxing just a hair. Straightening his shoulders, Conner takes a deep breath. “Let’s get this over with.”</p><p> </p><p>They’re noticed almost immediately as they finish cresting the hill.</p><p> </p><p>“Conner! You’re—I—oh,” Simon stutters to a halt as the four of them approach, eyebrows furrowing as his gaze catches on the S-shield on Conner’s chest before flickering between Lori, Tim, and Sujan. “Um, I didn’t know you were bringing everybody.”</p><p> </p><p>“We wanted to see your little surprise,” Lori says in a tone that’s not quite friendly, cocking a hip and crossing her arms over her chest. She only spares him a glance before her gaze locks back onto Lex, who’s talking into an earpiece. “Didn’t know you’d be bringing friends, either.”</p><p> </p><p>“Well, I, uh,” Simon stutters, clearly thrown. He’s glancing back and forth between Lex, Lori, and Conner, all of the casual confidence Tim had seen from him at the diner all those weeks ago completely evaporated. “My supervisor—this is Dr. Martin—thought that it was time to do a field test, and Mr. Luthor suggested that we—that we conduct it out here since there’s a lot of space, and said I could invite a friend to watch.”</p><p> </p><p>“How generous of him,” Lori says, her tone growing darker by the minute. “Really, really generous to fly you and all of this equipment all the way out here just to field test an intern’s project.”</p><p> </p><p>“Generosity is in my nature,” Lex says, dropping his hand from his ear and smiling at Lori. His smile is nearly as unfriendly as hers, if you know how to look. “And Simon’s work is really very promising. So much potential, don’t you think? It could have great impact in reducing the number of fatal incidents humans have with animals, implications for certain dangerous fields of work, might even one day help to ease the psychological burdens of space travel—who can say?”</p><p> </p><p>“What are you actually doing here?” Conner asks, steady but tense, and Simon is looking more and more worried by the minute—if he really isn’t in on Lex’s plan, Tim almost feels sorry for him.</p><p> </p><p>“Merely what Simon told you,” Lex says, placing a hand on Simon’s shoulder. Simon glances up at him, but the gesture doesn’t seem to relax him at all, and Tim can feel his fists curling at the way Lex is smirking. “We’re performing a field test. Is it ready, Dr. Martin?”</p><p> </p><p>“Good to go,” the woman says, not looking up. “Can we get this over with? My allergies are starting to act up.”</p><p> </p><p>Lex sighs and waves a hand at her, and the assistant moves to press a button on the antennae. It begins a slow rotation, and Martin squints at her screen for a minute before nodding. “We’re up.”</p><p> </p><p>There’s a pause, the only sound the breeze in the fields of corn across the road and the metallic whir of the antennae as it moves. Conner is as tense as Tim has ever seen him, looking like he’s not sure if he wants to run or take a swing at Lex. Lori, on the other hand, <em>clearly</em> wants to take a swing at Lex, her lips curling back from her teeth in a snarl that Tim feels in his soul, and Sujan—Sujan’s eyes are half-closed, a look of deep concentration on his face.</p><p> </p><p>Lex manages to give whatever is supposed to be happening about two minutes before he glares at Martin. “Well? Is it working?”</p><p> </p><p>“Should be,” she says, glancing up at Conner; Tim feels his jaw creak, adrenaline thumping through his system. Simon is looking at the cows, frowning, and moves behind Martin to lean over her shoulder, staring at the screen. When he looks back up at the cows, he seems to notice Sujan’s odd reaction, and his eyebrows furrow.</p><p> </p><p>“Is…?”</p><p> </p><p>Lex’s eyes flick to Simon, and he follows his gaze to Sujan, cocks an eyebrow. “Interesting. Remove that one.”</p><p> </p><p>One of his bodyguards crosses the 10 feet or so between the two groups, shoves Lori out of the way as she steps into his path. Sujan’s eyes flick open, and suddenly it’s chaos—the guard gets his hands on Sujan as Lori stumbles back, and Conner crumples to his knees clutching his head. There’s a thumping crack and Sujan falls backwards, and Tim hears Simon cry out as Conner goes utterly still for a long second before he’s just—<em>gone, </em>with a gust of wind so harsh it nearly knocks Tim over. <em>Fuck</em>.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>There</em> we go,” Lex says, sounding satisfied as he stares off towards the horizon in the direction that Conner disappeared.</p><p> </p><p>“What—but—the cows! You—you bought the cows, so we could… we could….” The look Lex turns on Simon is almost pitying as Simon stares at him, the color draining out of his face. Next to him, the assistant fires up the drones, a loud, mechanical din kicking up as they take off in the direction of Smallville.</p><p> </p><p>“I want to see the feed when they catch up to him,” Luthor tells the assistant, who nods.</p><p> </p><p>“They should catch up shortly—I outfitted them with much stronger motors than our standard model, so they can hit nearly a hundred and twenty miles an hour. He’s not going to be covering that much ground once he gets into town.”</p><p> </p><p>“Are you—did you send him back to <em>Smallville</em>?” Tim asks, appalled, and Lex looks at him for the first time, their eyes locking as fury starts to rise in Tim’s chest.</p><p> </p><p>“Who are you?” Lex asks, disinterested, and Tim swallows the urge to lunge for him, get his hands around the slimy bastard’s throat. Instead, he does the only thing he can think of to protect Conner.</p><p> </p><p><em>“Superman!” </em>He tips his head back, bellowing it at the top of his lungs and praying that Clark isn’t off-world or in the middle of some major crisis. Lex laughs, turns back to watch the monitor that the assistant turns towards him. Beside them, Martin lets out a dissatisfied little hum.</p><p> </p><p>“I told you it was too soon, Luthor.” Lex’s head snaps up and he turns to glare at her, fingers tapping impatiently against each other.</p><p> </p><p>“And what exactly is that supposed to mean, Dr. Martin?”</p><p> </p><p>“We don’t have full control,” she says, frowning and tapping a few more keys on the laptop. “He’s doing plenty of property damage, but we didn’t place any limits on the level of violence he should engage in, and he’s clearly avoiding killing. He’s ripping the roofs off of buildings and tearing up asphalt, but not a single person has been injured so far, even coincidentally.”</p><p> </p><p>Lex looks nearly as revolted as Tim feels, although Tim suspects it’s for a very different reason. “What, he’s got some <em>moral code</em> that you can’t override? Are we <em>sure</em> we used my DNA?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not my department,” Martin tells him, shrugging. “I can change the command to include specific directions to kill, but I don’t think it’s going to work. There’s obviously some level of higher functioning that the technology isn’t sophisticated enough to interfere with.”</p><p> </p><p>Beside her, Simon looks like he’s about to be sick, and Tim feels a little relieved that at least the idiot wasn’t in on <em>this</em>. Instinct kicks in, though, and he starts moving, edging towards the group while they’re distracted, figuring who he needs to take out first. Martin will be the priority, and then her assistant—Simon most likely knows how to stop whatever’s being done to Conner, so Tim will avoid him as much as possible. Once the scientists are down, the bodyguards will probably move in—Tim is pretty sure he can handle most of them, but there are six of them, they belong to Luthor, and all Tim is working with right now are his bare hands, so it might be iffy. If he can get Lori to create some sort of distraction, though, he can probably—</p><p> </p><p>“Tim?”</p><p> </p><p>He’s almost close enough to make his move when Clark, in all of his caped glory, touches down in front of Tim. He looks worried, glancing around, and his expression hardens into something grim when he sees Luthor. “What’s going on?”</p><p> </p><p>“You need to—” Tim starts, pointing back towards Smallville, but Luthor cuts in, grinning.</p><p> </p><p>“No need. Call him back, Dr. Martin.”</p><p> </p><p>Martin sighs, shaking her head. “This is <em>not</em> going to end well,” she mutters, but with the tap of a few keys and another rush of wind, Conner is back. There’s nothing visibly off about him this time—no glowing red eyes, no shaved head or L carved into his chest. It’s just Conner, and then Martin taps rapidly at her keyboard and Conner lunges at Clark, crashing into him with a thunderclap of steel-on-steel that’s loud enough to make Tim’s teeth ache.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>What</em>—?” Clark is caught off-guard enough that Conner’s momentum carries them straight through the side of the abandoned barn and out into the field behind it, skidding through the dirt until they carve a crater deep enough to slow them.</p><p> </p><p>“Mind control!” Tim shouts, feeling like his heart has given up on beating as he watches Conner drag Clark up into the air, hauling him around like he’s getting ready to slam him back into the earth. Fortunately, Clark seems to get his wits about him, because he keeps moving, turning the flow of the motion against Conner in a move that would make Bruce proud, wrenching Conner’s arm up behind his back. Conner manages to jerk his head far enough around to clip the corner of Clark’s jaw with his heat vision, and Clark hisses through his teeth, his grip weakening just enough that Conner can shoot out of his grasp.</p><p> </p><p>As Tim’s most familiar nightmare unfolds above him, the two of them clashing overhead in battle with all the violent power of a natural disaster, Tim tries to force his brain back into gear. Looking around, he locks in on Lori, still hunched over Sujan’s prone form, and it clicks in his mind, the look on Sujan’s face as if he had been concentrating deeply, the fact that Conner had only succumbed when Sujan had been distracted. Tim takes two sprinting strides back towards Lori and drops down beside her, grabbing her shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>“Lori, listen to me, okay? Is Conner close enough in range that you could get in his head, interfere with whatever they’re doing to him?” It comes out in a low rush, and although they had talked about this earlier, Lori looks at him with naked fear in her eyes, shrugs helplessly, unprepared for the jarring reality of the situation. Tim grips her shoulder a little harder than is strictly polite, shakes her. “Lori, I need to know. You could save Conner’s life.”</p><p> </p><p>The horror in her expression only deepens, but Tim can see her getting ahold of herself, taking a deep breath. She eyes the distance, makes an uncertain hand gesture. “I’m not as good as Sujan—I’ve got a range of about twenty feet if I want to be sure. I <em>might</em> be able to get through, but they’re up kind of high. Can’t promise anything.”</p><p> </p><p>Gritting his teeth, Tim watches and waits for the two of them to come back together, Conner slamming a fist into Clark’s ribs with a sickening crack. As it happens, Tim raises his voice and talks as quickly as he can, covered by the sound. “Drop ten feet, Superman!”</p><p> </p><p>If anyone in Lex’s posse hears him, they mostly catch him calling out a hero’s name, but Clark grabs Conner, wrestles him down towards the ground even as Conner fights him, jamming a knee into Clark’s stomach. Tim glances at Lori, but she already has her eyes closed, and Conner goes still in Clark’s grasp, his chest heaving.</p><p> </p><p>“Don’t let me hurt anyone,” Tim hears Conner beg, and Clark’s expression crumples as he shifts his grip to drag Conner in, holds him to his chest in a way that has nothing to do with restraining him. “Whatever you have to do, please, just don’t let me—don’t—”</p><p> </p><p>All of the rage Tim has been suppressing in an effort to stay in control of the situation comes surging back, and he’s up and running, leaps straight over the folding table Lex’s people have set up and slams into Dr. Martin without a second thought. Her head hits the dirt with a crunch that might concern Tim in any other circumstance, but he’s already moving, slams an elbow into the jaw of her assistant as he steps forward, reaching a hand out towards Martin. He knows that Lex is sending someone after Lori, and it’s seconds before Conner is out of control again, thrashing against Clark’s grasp. Tim doesn’t see what Conner does, but Clark yelps and lets go, and in his peripheral vision Tim can see that there’s a man in a black suit with a fistful of Lori’s hair.</p><p> </p><p>The rest of the people in black suits are closing in on Tim, and he takes the scant seconds he has before they reach him to grab Simon’s shirt and shake him until Simon’s terrified gaze snaps back from the fight that’s happening in the air.</p><p> </p><p>“<em>Fix</em> this!” Tim snarls, and it’s maybe not the most useful direction he’s ever given, but Simon <em>invented</em> the damned tech, after all. He drags Simon towards the laptop Martin had been using, practically throws him down in front of it, and moves to meet the rest of Lex’s bodyguards.</p><p> </p><p>He had thought it might be difficult, a lopsided fight when he’s out of costume and trying not to set off any alarm bells about his identity, but he’s sort of given up on the second part, and he’s pissed enough that the first bit isn’t really slowing him down. There’s so much adrenaline coursing through him that every heartbeat hurts, his body nearly overloaded, but years of training mean that his control holds, and the anger just spurs him faster rather than making him sloppy. He’s brutally effective as he smashes his elbows and heels into throats, groins, ribs, does whatever it takes to get past the five goons standing between him and Lori. He needs as many options as he can get his hands on to stop Conner, and Lori is somehow still fighting—Tim is pretty sure she kicked the guy who grabbed her in the crotch, based on the way he’s hunched over.</p><p> </p><p>Still, as the fifth guard goes down, there’s one last figure standing in his way: Lex. The bastard is staring at Tim now, eyes narrowed, and he starts to take up a fighting stance, but Tim is already on him. He hauls his arm back so hard he nearly wrenches his shoulder, and there’s a sick sort of satisfaction to it as his fist connects with Lex’s jaw hard enough that he hears bone crunch and snap—he’s not sure whose, and he doesn’t really care. Lex crumples to the ground, and Tim keeps moving.</p><p> </p><p>The last suit knocks Lori out seconds before Tim decks him—and yeah, Tim <em>definitely</em> broke his hand on Lex’s face, <em>ow</em>—and he drops, collapsing half on top of Lori. Tim drags him off one-handed, can’t help the vicious grin as he notices a bloody nose that Tim knows he’s not responsible for. Lori is quickly Tim’s favorite for very good reason.</p><p> </p><p>Tim only has a second to get his bearings, though, because somewhere overhead Conner hits Clark hard enough that the air trembles with the sound of it. Clark smashes into the ground, a crater opening like a gaping wound in the earth as the dirt gives under the force of the impact. He doesn’t get up.</p><p> </p><p>“Simon!” Tim yells, but Simon has his face buried in the laptop screen, shakes his head frantically.</p><p> </p><p>“Almost—they altered the controls, I just need another minute—”  </p><p> </p><p>They don’t have another minute, though, because Conner has shot up high enough that he’s a mere speck in the sky, and Clark is just starting to stir, groaning and moving like he’s really hurt. Tim does the only thing he can think of—as Conner rockets back down to earth, closing the distance rapidly with the obvious intent of putting Clark down for good, Tim makes the stupidest decision of his life, and steps in front of him.</p><p> </p><p>He’s not really expecting to have a next thought. He can’t tell if Conner is still in there somewhere right now—he figures he’ll just sort of evaporate into a pink mist, and at least that mist can have the satisfaction of knowing that it might, just maybe, have saved Superman’s life. There’s a long, slow moment where he’s desperately glad that he got to know what kissing Conner feels like, thinks maybe this is okay, that he’s gotten to have enough good things in life after all, and braces himself for impact as a black blur overtakes his vision.</p><p> </p><p>Instead of pain or fear or nothing, though, the next thing Tim feels is the overwhelming beat of his own heart in his chest as he finds himself marveling at the intense, electric blue of Conner’s eyes. They’re locked on his own as Conner hovers in front of him, inches from the tip of Tim’s nose. Tim swallows, takes a breath that feels shockingly real, but Conner doesn’t move—those eyes are oddly blank, and then they’re gone from Tim’s line of vision as Simon shouts, “Got it!” and Conner drops out of the air to his knees.</p><p> </p><p>Tim is about to fall down beside him, follow the impulse to grab him and make sure he’s okay, except Conner topples forward, knocking Tim backwards, and vomits.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh boy,” Tim murmurs, because he can’t remember the last time he saw Conner throw up, and he crouches beside Conner, rubs a hand gently between his shoulder blades as he dry-heaves. It’s kind of adding to the surreal feeling of not being dead, but he figures Conner always does this kind of thing for him, and he’s suddenly almost giddy with joy at being able to return the favor. “Hey, you’re okay now. It's okay.”</p><p> </p><p>“I am gonna be,” Conner says after a minute, swiping the back of his wrist across his mouth, “<em>so</em> <em>mad</em> at you as soon as we get home. What the <em>fuck,</em> Tim.”</p><p> </p><p>“…Fair enough,” Tim decides after a brief pause—he knows he would be beyond furious at Conner if he had pulled a stunt like Tim just did, so he’s not going to argue about that. “Do you feel okay? Dizzy, disoriented?”</p><p> </p><p>Clark is starting to get up as Tim quizzes Conner, and Tim backs up as Clark staggers over and reaches a hand down to Conner, pulls him up even though Clark is still clutching his side with one hand. Conner starts to stumble, but Clark catches him, hugs him roughly, one-armed. There’s a second’s hesitation before Conner buries his face in Clark’s shoulder, wrapping his own arms around Clark.</p><p> </p><p>“Sorry,” he mutters, muffled. “Thank you.”</p><p> </p><p>“Nothing to apologize for,” Clark says, reaching up to ruffle Conner’s hair. He’s only got maybe two inches on Conner at this point, and the gesture makes Tim smile, happy for them in a way that makes his chest hurt. “And nothing to thank me for. You stopped yourself.”</p><p> </p><p>Shrugging, Conner pulls back to look at Tim, and his eyes narrow when they catch on the way Tim is holding his hand against his body, almost cradling it.</p><p> </p><p>“How’d you break your hand?”</p><p> </p><p>“Uh,” Tim says, glancing over his shoulder at Lex. He’s still out cold, and there’s a beat of silence before Conner starts laughing.</p><p> </p><p>“Holy shit, babe,” he gasps, shaking his head even as he grins broadly at Tim. “Knew I was dating you for a reason.”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, yeah,” Tim mutters darkly, glaring at Lex. The not-dead euphoria is already starting to wear off, and the reminder of what caused the whole incident in the first place sets Tim right back on the warpath.</p><p> </p><p>Tim makes his way back over to Lex’s prone form, nudges him with the toe of one shoe to check if he’s still unconscious. Lex stirs, braces himself on one arm, and pushes himself up just far enough to spit a mouthful of blood at Tim’s feet. Reflexively, Tim kicks him in the ribs, although he pulls it a little, just leaves Lex wheezing. As much as he’s pretty sure that at this point he could happily murder Lex if he met him on equal footing somewhere, it still feels wrong to break a guy’s ribs when he’s already down. Instead, he grits his teeth against the agony of it and settles for slowly forcing the middle finger of his broken hand up through sheer willpower, flipping Lex off with both hands.</p><p> </p><p>Behind him, he hears Conner tell Clark quietly, in a helplessly earnest tone laced with laughter, “I think I’m in love.” Tim’s heart sort of trips in his chest, a squeezing, breathless sensation, and he feels himself blush violently, his whole face going hot up to the tips of his ears.</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, shit, he heard me,” Conner mutters, and Tim hears Clark turn a snorting laugh into a cough. Tim is never going to live any part of this down. Probably worth it, he thinks.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>tbh i had a really hard time writing this chapter, i hope the ending isn't too abrupt!! ive only had like... three days of productive writing in the last two weeks and just couldn't get more in at the end without missing another week of posting, but i think it's a normal-length chapter for me, so hopefully it's okay! also, i really like writing lori lol</p><p>also!!! i am so sorry but i think i just need to tell yall that i'm probably not going to be able to respond to comments in a timely manner from now on. truthfully i am... so exhausted all the time and i just haven't been able to get it done, i feel so bad about it bc i really want everyone to know how much it means to me to get such kind and supportive feedback on every chapter but it's just! not happening! i'm still going to be trying to go back and answer people in chronological order as much as i can but if it takes me six weeks to answer your comment please know that i still read it, felt incredibly encouraged by it, loved you for it, and will appreciate it textually when i'm able to! (and if you don't feel interested in commenting knowing that it might be a while before i answer, that's okay too, i still deeply appreciate you reading!)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Chapter 14</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello again!! This chapter is... maybe a bit of an emotional rollercoaster lol?? Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well! Enjoy!!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They don’t end up getting much out of Lex or his group—most of them are still unconscious, and when they try to get him to talk, they discover that Tim has also managed to break Lex’s jaw. Conner shoots him an amused look; Tim just shrugs.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Useless,” Lori mutters, glaring at Lex. The look he gives her is expressive, and he gestures indignantly at his face, which is rapidly beginning to swell. Lori crosses her arms over her chest and somehow manages to glare even harder at him—Tim is glad she doesn’t have heat vision. “Yeah, and whose fault is that, huh?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Lex points emphatically at Tim, who flips him off again—although only with his good hand, this time. “Right, it’s <em>my</em> fault that <em>you</em> decided, with <em>no provocation whatsoever, </em> to come out here and try to mind-control Superboy into destroying a town and fighting Superman, resulting in me justifiably breaking your jaw to put an end to it. My bad, definitely.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Alright, I’m going to get this group back to Metropolis,” Clark says, edging his way in between Tim and Lex. Glancing at Simon, who’s been sitting on the ground with his head between his knees since Conner came back to his senses, Clark looks uncertainly at Tim. “Am I taking him, too, or…?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No, it’s—I don’t think he was involved,” Conner says from where he’s crouched next to Sujan, one hand on the psychic’s back as he sits up and touches his bruising cheek gingerly. “He lives here, anyway. I’ll get him home.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Once Clark rounds up Luthor and his people and gets them back to Metropolis—Tim has no idea what he plans to do with them, but he’s happy to let it be someone else’s problem—Tim wants nothing more than to go back to the farm and collapse into bed with Conner. Lori and Sujan both seem relatively unhurt, which Tim is grateful for. There’s going to be some bruising that will be awkward to explain, but Tim does quick checks for concussions and they both seem fine, and once Conner finishes covering up the worst of the mess he and Clark made, he confirms that no one’s brains are swelling, bleeding, or otherwise misbehaving.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim waits with Simon while Conner drops the two of them off in town—Simon still isn’t really responding to anything, and frankly, Tim doesn’t particularly want to talk to him right now, anyway. He’s happy to ignore Simon in favor of piling up the electronics Lex’s group had brought for Clark to retrieve later. When Conner comes back, he crouches down again and speaks softly to Simon for a few minutes. Eventually Simon nods slightly, and Conner grabs him by the wrist and pulls him up into the air, quickly disappearing with him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim lets himself be whisked back to the farm in the same fashion, and once they’re back and settled in Conner’s room, he has Conner check his hand over more thoroughly. It’s definitely broken, and Tim is pretty sure he can take care of it himself, but Conner starts getting the stubborn look on his face that means Tim’s not getting away until Conner thinks he’s been properly looked after. They compromise on Tim calling Alfred for advice on how to take care of it—Smallville’s hospital is great, Tim is sure, but he really doesn’t want to spend the next however many hours sitting around getting prodded and x-rayed for a doctor to just tape his hand up and tell him to ice it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hey, Alfred,” Tim says when the butler picks up on the second ring. On the other end of the line, Tim can hear a soft, steady <em>thunk-thunk-thunk</em> in the background that makes him think he must have caught Alfred making dinner.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Master Timothy. To what do I owe the pleasure?” Alfred sounds pleased, but a little wary, which Tim figures is probably fair, given the sorts of phone calls Alfred usually gets from his assorted grandchildren.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Would you believe me if I said I was just calling to say hi?” Conner rolls his eyes; Tim ignores him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I would have, had you not asked that question, young master. How may I assist you?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I broke my hand,” Tim says plainly. Somehow, he can hear the long-suffering sigh even though Alfred doesn’t make a sound.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I see,” Alfred says after a beat, and Tim can feel himself starting to blush even though the tone is completely neutral. “I must confess, I do wonder how that came about. Perhaps you had some sort of cow-related accident? Closed your hand in the barn door? Tripped while you were frolicking through the fields?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“…I might have punched somebody in the face,” Tim admits, sheepish. Alfred does sigh out loud this time, not that Tim can really blame him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“<em>Vacation</em>, Master Timothy,” is all he says.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay, give me that,” Conner mutters as Tim opens his mouth to defend himself, and reaches over to pluck the phone out of Tim’s good hand. Tim lets it happen, leans back on his elbow and accepts his fate with mild curiosity. The thought of Conner and Alfred interacting more than in passing is a weird mixture of charming, thrilling, and absolutely terrifying, but he thinks he likes it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hi, Alfred, this is Conner. Tim’s gonna take forever making up excuses—he doesn’t need them, by the way, it was awesome—so can you tell me how to take care of his hand?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim watches as Conner listens to whatever Alfred is saying with a serious expression on his face, leaning in to examine Tim’s hand more closely.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, it looks fine. It’s the middle—just the metacarpal. No fragments—uh-huh. Okay, so—” he motions for Tim to scoot closer to him where he’s sitting at the foot of his bed, a first aid kit spread out in front of him. Gesturing for Tim’s broken hand with one of his own, he places his palm under Tim’s, and Tim feels the invisible pressure of Conner’s TTK wrapping around his hand, securing it so that Tim can only move it as Conner wants him to.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Got it,” Conner says, folding a bit of cotton gauze from the first aid kit and tucking it carefully up against the side of Tim’s finger. He holds it in place as Tim feels the TTK moving his ring finger in to press firmly up against the middle, where the knuckle looks swollen and is already starting to bruise. Tim figures he knows where Conner’s hard head comes from now, at least. Conner, for his part, is nodding even though he’s on the phone with Alfred, making small affirmative noises as he picks up a roll of tape and uses his TTK to start winding it around the base of Tim’s fingers, trapping the gauze between them. He repeats the process further up, around the first knuckles, and then sits back, idly stroking the side of Tim’s hand as he listens to Alfred’s instructions.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay, yeah. With the TTK I can immobilize it, so… once a night, right, okay. Will do. Thanks, Alfred. Bye.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Hanging up, he hands the phone back to Tim and starts packing up the first aid kit, putting everything away. “He said just taping your hand should be fine since it’s a clean break, but that we should try to unwrap it for a little while and change the taping at night since I can keep you from accidentally moving the knuckle. Something about preventing skin necrosis….”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The face he’s making gets a laugh out of Tim. “Okay, Nurse Kent. Thanks.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner smiles, but it’s a wan little thing, nothing like the usual warm looks Conner gives him. Tim feels tension starting to seep back into his muscles, putting him on edge. It’s never good when Conner starts retreating—that’s generally Tim’s job, and when Conner starts getting cagey, it means something is seriously wrong.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Conner,” Tim says, shifting closer on the bed and reaching out with his good hand. “What are you thinking?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The muscles in Conner’s wrist are twitching beneath Tim’s fingers, nearly trembling, but Conner just shakes his head. “Nothing, I just—I gotta get out there and start cleaning up, okay? I… it’s pretty bad in town.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Right,” Tim says, glancing towards the window. “Sun’ll start setting soon, I guess. I just thought you might want to… talk about things a little bit?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I <em>can’t</em>,” Conner says, and Tim was trying to be gentle, but he sounds so upset, <em>angry</em>—Tim knows it’s not really for him, but it still stings. “You said it yourself, the sun’s gonna start going down soon—it’s not going to stop getting dark and cold for the people whose homes and businesses I destroyed just because I feel bad, alright? I have to <em>go</em>, Tim.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay,” Tim agrees, tries to keep his tone as neutral as possible. It’s an overreaction and Tim is sure that Conner knows it, but he’s not going to turn this into a fight, make everything worse when it’s obviously already so bad. As much as he wants to get his hackles up about Conner snapping at him, his heart still aches to think of what the whole situation must be doing to Conner, feeling responsible for the destruction of a place that’s come to mean so much to him—community, home, <em>family</em>. What happened isn’t his fault, but Tim knows it’s going to take a while to convince Conner of that. Instead of arguing, he digs into his back pocket and tugs a card out of his wallet, offering it to Conner. “Go do what you need to. I’ll be here when you’re done.”  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That’s…?” The anger in Conner’s expression softens as he eyes what’s in Tim’s hand, hesitates before stepping a little closer.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re going to need to buy supplies if you’re doing repairs. It’s not like anyone is expecting you to take it out of your pocket money. I’m not going to be much use putting houses back together with a broken hand, but I can do this much, at least.” He smiles, a peace offering, and Conner’s shoulders slump, the expression on his face so broken that Tim has to fight not to drag him back down to the bed and not let go.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It only lasts for a second, though—Tim can see the tension in Conner’s throat as he swallows, lips pressing into a thin line as his eyes drop to the toes of his boots. He nods, reaches out to accept the credit card as Tim presses it into his hand. “Thank you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>His voice is rough as he tucks the card into his pocket, and then he’s gone, and Tim is alone with his broken hand and heavy heart. Taking a minute to pull himself together, he gathers his thoughts—Ma hadn’t been home when they got back, probably already in town helping out, so he’s truly alone in the house, and it makes him feel strangely helpless, not sure what to do with himself in this quiet moment of crisis. Glancing at his phone, he realizes it’s about the time that Ma would usually start dinner, so Tim makes his way down to the kitchen and finds her recipe book on the counter, flipped open to a page for chicken noodle soup.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s slow going, cooking with only one hand, but Tim manages. He’s never really been much of a cook, surviving off of takeout and Alfred’s food in Gotham, but he’s been helping Ma in the kitchen more and more often as the summer goes on, half to stave off boredom and half because it’s actually kind of nice. Ma is always a pleasure to be around, sharp as a tack and kind, and she’s seemed to enjoy showing Tim around the kitchen, never minded that he could have burned water when he first started helping out.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Now, he’s got enough experience under his belt that he’s able to pull the recipe together with minimal difficulty, broken hand aside. He even doubles the batch without ruining the recipe, figuring teaspoons into tablespoons and ounces into pounds. He’s pretty sure not a single one of his chopped vegetables is the same size or shape, nothing like Ma’s neat, even cubes, but the soup still tastes alright when it’s done, he thinks, and that’s probably what matters.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ladling the soup carefully into two of the thermoses Ma keeps in one of the cabinets, he stores the leftovers in the fridge and packs the thermoses up in a canvas grocery bag with two spoons and a few pieces of the bread Ma made yesterday afternoon and sets off down the road to find Ma and Conner. The sun is already starting to dip below the horizon, and it’ll be dark by the time he makes it into town, let alone tracks the two of them down, but he walks slowly. He’s not going to be deterred from taking care of Conner however he can, not right now, but the harder it is for people to see what’s going on, the less explaining he’ll have to do about why he’s only brought food for Ma and Superboy.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The closer he gets to the edge of town, the worse things look. There’s debris nearly a mile out, by Tim’s guess, and even as the sky bleeds inky overhead, he can make out just how many buildings are missing roofs and front walls. By the time he gets close enough to see the “Welcome to Smallville” sign ripped from its usual post, he’s having to pick his way carefully up along the edges of the road, which has been torn up more than once, with more than one type of object—Tim catches sight of grooves that look like fingers in the edges of the asphalt, but there are also discarded steel beams dug into wide gashes of dirt down the center of the road.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The night is eerily quiet, even for Smallville, and although it’s not late, there’s hardly anyone on the streets as Tim maneuvers his way towards the heart of town, where the destruction is worst. The few people he does see are hurrying towards city hall with bags and backpacks—Tim figures they must be setting up to host people who have been displaced there. He makes a mental note to check there for Ma and to see if there’s anything he can do to help.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>As he walks, he notices that things are definitely cleaner further in town than they were at the outskirts; the debris has been gathered into neat piles, the streets cleared enough that the sidewalks are useable. The deep wounds in the center of Main Street look smooth and even, like the dirt has already been packed back down, and Tim feels the rush of wind before he can see the gravel filling in over the dirt, a uniform layer stretching out faster than Tim’s eyes can follow in the dark.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Kon,” he calls softly, and there’s more wind as Conner is suddenly in front of him, blinking down at him in confusion.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Tim?” He sounds tired and maybe a little impatient, but Tim just grabs one of the thermoses out of his bag and shoves it at Conner.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Superhero or not, you still need to eat,” Tim tells him in his most no-nonsense Robin tone. Conner takes the thermos automatically, and Tim smiles. “Why don’t you sit down for a few minutes? It looks like you’re making pretty good headway out here.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner sighs, but he does find a clear stretch of curb to sit down on, twisting the thermos open. Tim sits beside him, handing Conner a spoon and a piece of bread on a napkin before sitting back and surveying the area as best he can.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Did you make this? We haven’t had soup in a while,” Conner says, sounding surprised. Tim shrugs, flicking shards of rubble off the curb.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Ma left the recipe out before she left, so I figured I’d give it a try. I doubled the recipe, if they need help feeding people at city hall. You can go get the leftovers when you’re done.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner pauses for a minute, takes another mouthful and swallows before setting everything down carefully beside him and turning to pull Tim into a hug. It’s a little awkward, Tim’s shoulder jammed into Conner’s chest in a way that would be uncomfortable to someone less impervious, but Tim is happy to lean into it, squeeze Conner’s forearm as Conner presses a kiss to the top of Tim’s head.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re the best,” Conner says, so earnestly that Tim’s stomach flips a little with the happiness it sparks. “I can’t believe you’re dating me—I am <em>so</em> lucky you have bad taste.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim snorts, smacks Conner’s shoulder as best he can from this angle. “Shut up. You don’t get to start talking shit about yourself for something that’s not your fault.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I know,” Conner says, sighs into Tim’s hair. The angle of the embrace shifts as Conner turns his head away, tucks his face into the gap between his shoulder and the top of Tim’s head, his breath gusting down the shell of Tim’s ear. It’s more intimate, warmer, and Tim shrugs one arm free to reach up and wrap it around the back of Conner’s neck, cradling him closer as Conner’s arm slips around his waist. “We’ll… can we talk about it later? When we’re home?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Of course,” Tim assures him. Carding his fingers through Conner’s hair, he scratches his nails along Conner’s nape before pulling back, squeezing the back of his neck gently. “Why don’t you finish eating? I’ll stick around until you’re done and then go find Ma, okay?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Nodding, Conner settles back and picks his food up again, balancing everything carefully on his lap. “Yeah, sure. She’s up at city hall, I think, helping people get settled. I could go grab the food from the house and drop you off with it?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That sounds good,” Tim agrees, and they settle back into silence as Conner eats. It’s almost a comfortable silence, and then another gust of air blows by—there’s a loud clatter in the distance, and Tim squints in the dark.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Is that…?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, he came back to help,” Conner says, and there’s a blur in front of Tim’s eyes that resolves into Clark, smiling his friendly Superman smile down at the two of them.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hi, Tim,” Clark greets him, and Tim smiles and gives a little wave.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hi, Superman. I didn’t know you were helping out, or I would have brought food for you, too.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh, that’s alright,” Clark says, patting his stomach contentedly. “I was fed when I stopped in Metropolis to drop Lex and his friends off.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Right, I meant to ask—what did you end up doing with them? Did you just take them to the police, or…?” Clark’s smile shifts into a wicked grin that looks nothing like Superman, and Tim feels himself sit up straighter automatically in response, eager to find out what puts a look like <em>that</em> on Superman’s face.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh, much worse,” Clark assures him, and Tim glances at Conner, desperately curious. Conner looks equally intrigued, though, and after a pause that’s almost certainly for dramatic effect, Clark takes pity on the two of them. “I left them with Lois.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The chuckle that bubbles up in Tim’s throat quickly turns into full-blown cackling, and Tim laughs so long and hard that he almost cries. “When he’s got a <em>broken jaw</em>? I can’t believe people really think you’re the nice one in the Justice League,” Tim gasps eventually, wiping his eyes. “<em>Wow</em>.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“It felt appropriate,” Clark says, and his tone is mild, but there’s still something just a touch vicious in his smile. Tim shakes his head, still snickering. “Well, I’m going to get back to work. Good to see you, Tim.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim waves, and Clark is gone again—Tim fights down a sigh about showoff superheroes and their damned superspeed, leans absently against Conner’s shoulder as he finishes eating.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hey,” Conner says, nudging Tim lightly as he screws the cap back on the thermos. “That was actually pretty good. Thanks for bringing it.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“’Pretty good’,” Tim mutters, nudging Conner back, but he’s smiling. The smile fades when he notices Conner starting to get that distant, distracted look in his eye again, though, and Tim takes a deep breath, sits up straight so that Conner can stand without knocking him over. Sure enough, Conner pushes himself up, rolls his shoulders and glances back down at Tim, that tight, false smile back in place.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m gonna go grab those leftovers and get back to it, okay? I don’t want the big guy having to do it all himself.” Tim eyes Conner skeptically from the curb, pretty sure there’s no way Clark is “doing it all”, but nods and stretches.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sure. You’re coming back for me, right?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, of course. I’ll just be a minute. And seriously, thanks again, Tim,” Conner says, bending down and pressing a quick kiss to Tim’s forehead before taking off. Tim bites the inside of his cheek, stares off in the direction that Conner went for a long minute before pushing himself to his feet.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He takes the few minutes that Conner is gone to poke around the area a little more, take a look at some of the buildings. There’s a line of shopfronts that have been raked, siding ripped off and windows shattered, and he can make out in the soft glow of the streetlamps what looks like similar damage on the other side of the road a little further up. It’s hard to get a proper count, though, and Conner is back soon enough, two bags over one shoulder as he scoops Tim up in his arms.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s nice, Tim thinks, to be able to wrap his own arms around Conner’s neck and just enjoy the ride now. He’s fussed about it a bit for the sake of appearances, but privately, he doesn’t really object to the fact that Conner has started picking him up bridal-style more and more often, and he’s certainly not going to complain about it right now—it might be embarrassing, but it’s also an excuse for Conner to hold him, for Tim to lean his head against Conner’s shoulder and let go for a few minutes, and he’s pretty sure they could both use that tonight. It’s funny to think that just weeks ago, these little jaunts used to be so nerve-wracking, terrifying. Now Tim doesn’t have to worry if Conner hears his breath catch or his heart beat faster, and it feels good to know he has permission to just enjoy the view and the warmth of Conner’s body pressed against his side.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Too soon, Conner touches down outside of city hall, sets Tim carefully back on his feet. Glancing around, he presses one last, quick kiss to Tim’s mouth, and then smiles crookedly and heads inside alone. Tim watches him go, wanders off around the side of the building and waits until he sees Conner come out, then gives it a few more minutes before heading in. As curious as he is to see Superboy interacting with Ma, note the differences and similarities between when he’s just Conner, the less the two of them are seen together, the better.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>As he makes his way inside after waiting what feels like long enough, Tim’s stomach sinks—the lobby has been cleared and re-filled with cots and sleeping bags, and there are quite a few people gathered there. Some of them must be friends and neighbors or volunteers, Tim assumes, but he would guess there are well over a hundred people packed into the space, and he understands Conner’s sense of urgency more fully. He hasn’t seen the damage in the light of day, and it certainly hadn’t looked <em>good</em>, but it’s different to see so many people, to realize how many of them Conner probably <em>knows</em>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Ma is easy to spot, at least. She’s up near the desk at the top of the lobby, her hand on a woman’s shoulder, smiling and nodding as she listens. Tim makes his way over, catches Ma’s eye but stands back until she escorts the woman back to a cluster of cots where a man and two children, maybe five and eight years old, are waiting for her. Once everyone seems as settled as they can be, Ma turns back and heads towards Tim, reaching out to pull him into a hug even before she stops moving.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Tim, dear, are you alright?” Tim smiles into her shoulder, hugs her back briefly before pulling back to nod.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m fine, Ma. Shitty afternoon, but no lasting damage.” She raises an eyebrow and glances down at his hand, and Tim blushes a little, shrugs. “This’ll heal up in a few weeks. No big deal.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“If you say so, dear,” she agrees. Tim takes the opportunity to distract her by fishing the second thermos out of his bag, offering it to her. Smiling, she takes it and gestures for Tim to follow her as she heads for a folding chair by the same desk she was standing at earlier.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re such a help, Tim. Thank you for cooking tonight—I can’t imagine I’m going to feel up to it when I get home. And doubling the batch to help feed everyone was very thoughtful of you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Of course. Is it—how bad was it out there?” Tim asks, glancing towards the door. He hops up on the desk next to Ma as she sits down and digs in, and he pulls out a spoon, napkin, and bread for her, laying them out as she pours soup into the lid of the thermos. She hums, wobbles her head back and forth uncertainly.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Not good, of course, but we’ve been through worse. Maybe a dozen businesses and not quite that many houses damaged or partially destroyed, and Main Street is pretty well torn up. But with Superman and Superboy out there on the job, I suspect things will be put to rights quickly enough.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Her smile is reassuring, and Tim finds himself incredibly glad that Ma exists in the world, and particularly in Conner’s life. She’s steady as a rock, sympathetic and unruffled in the face of an emergency; she’s got years of this under her belt with Clark and Conner, Tim knows, but he still sort of envies her, the way she seems to be able to channel whatever anxiety and angst she must be feeling into an energy that’s kind and useful. Of course, Tim is very good in an emergency himself, but it’s a different sort of first impulse—rather than, “how can I help?” Tim has been trained to ask, “what’s the threat?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>You need all sorts in the world, he supposes, but he wouldn’t mind having a bit less of Batman’s <em>identify threat, eliminate, reassess</em> instinct and a bit more of Ma’s brand of crisis management. Conner takes more after Ma, Tim thinks, has absorbed some of her more nurturing impulses over the years. He’s turned into a bit of a worrier, and Tim would love to see him quit beating himself up over everything, but he does like the effect Smallville seems to have had on Conner, evening him out and grounding him, giving him a more genuine sense of why they’re doing what they do. Taking care of people seems to come naturally to Conner, and Tim is glad even as he wishes he were a bit more like that, himself.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The years don’t seem to have done that for Tim, after all. He cares, of course, cares deeply and will help in whatever way he’s needed, but passing out the stack of blankets that Ma hands him, smiling and trying to reassure the people sleeping in the hall tonight, doesn’t come as naturally to him as slamming the heel of his palm into the nose of Lex’s bodyguard had. Violence has become an easy, methodical thing for him, so much simpler than the messiness of emotion, and he wonders again just how far from Bruce’s mission he’d really been straying in his grief. After all, Batman is a looming menace in the night for criminals and ne’er-do-wells, but at his best, he doesn’t hesitate to comfort someone who’s hurt or afraid, hold a child’s hand as he walks them home. As he moves through the crowd here, Tim makes a point to ask people how they’re holding up, help them arrange their cots and blankets and crouch down to look children in the eye when they speak.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You really didn’t need to stay, dear,” Ma tells him as they cross paths again. It’s getting late, and most people seem to be settling in for the night, tucking their children in and climbing into their cots and sleeping bags. “We seem to have things pretty well under control here. I’ll be heading home shortly, I think. Would you like to ride back with me?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Thanks, Ma,” he says, smiling and shaking his head. “I’m okay, though. I’m going to head back out and… keep an eye on things.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He glances toward the big double doors at the front of the building, and Ma nods, her expression understanding. “I see. Try not to be out too late, alright, dear? And thank you. I’m glad to know you’re looking after him.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Always,” Tim says, one corner of his mouth tugging upward. Ma reaches out and takes Tim’s hand, giving it a little squeeze and a pat before moving on again, pausing on her way to gather her things to speak with a group of a few women still standing together. Tim watches for a second and then turns and makes his way back towards the front of the hall—things have really cleared out now, and it doesn’t look so bad anymore, probably less than forty people in the hall. It makes him feel a little better as he moves back out into the night, makes his way slowly down Main Street.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When he finds his way back to the torn up section of the road, he finds Clark and Conner just finishing up smoothing out and compressing the asphalt they’ve laid, Clark hovering close to the ground and squinting at their handiwork. Tim sometimes forgets just how often the two of them end up pressed into service as one-man construction crews when there’s clean up to be done after a disaster, but the way Clark is eyeballing the grade of the road is downright professional.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No, I think it’s level,” he says, nodding. “I’ll finish it out; why don’t you go and get started cleaning up that section out by the edge of town? If we can get these roads in shape tonight, that will make a pretty good start.”  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner takes off with a quick nod, and Tim watches him as far as he can as he disappears into the night sky. There’s a little huff of sound that’s almost a sigh, and it’s enough to tug Tim’s attention back around. Clark is standing with his hands on his hips, a worried frown on his face as he stares off in the same direction Tim had been.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“He thinks it’s his fault,” Tim says, soft in the quiet of the night. Clark shakes his head, frown deepening as he glances over at Tim.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I know. It’s <em>my</em> fault, really, for not keeping a better eye on Lex. I should have known he wouldn’t be content to lay low for long.” Tim raises an eyebrow at him, knows he can see it perfectly well in the dark, and Clark chuckles and rubs the back of his neck ruefully. “Alright, maybe he gets that from me.”  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Definitely not from Lex,” Tim agrees. “He’s a good person, but I think he’s still trying to talk himself into believing it. Incidents like this don’t help.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“He’s grown a lot,” Clark says, and pauses to hold his hands in front of himself and crouch over the new asphalt, takes a deep breath and blows a carefully-controlled stream of freezing air into his hands. Once they’re completely frozen in a sizeable block of ice, he floats back to the sidewalk and uses his heat vision to thaw them back out, shaking the water off and wiping his hands on his cape. Walking back to the same section of the asphalt, he kneels down and presses the tips of his fingers into it, nodding before moving on. “It was difficult enough for <em>me</em> not to feel like some sort of monster when my powers started coming in. Doing as much good as you can helps, but it’s easy to get sucked into feeling like it’s never enough, or like the fact that you <em>could</em> do something terrible makes you a constant threat, and that helping people is the penance you pay to justify your own existence.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He pauses again to repeat the ice-breath process with the asphalt, then continues as he melts the ice off his hands. “I can’t imagine how it must be for Conner, feeling tied to Luthor, and this threat of being weaponized by him…. It must feel like all of his worst fears coming true—I don’t blame him for struggling with it.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>As fascinating as it is to hear this sort of introspective emotional analysis coming from Clark, <em>Superman</em>, the words settle in Tim’s gut like a lead weight. Tim has known about Conner’s bad habit of taking responsibility for things that aren’t really his fault, knows how much he worries about being a good person, being good enough to <em>be</em> a person, but hearing it laid out so starkly from someone who understands it first-hand is unnerving.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No, it’s… I see how it makes sense to him,” Tim agrees reluctantly, and they lapse into silence as Clark moves further away, working his way up the road in sections. When he finishes up, he takes off, and Tim follows slowly, makes his way towards the edge of town where Conner has been working alone. He’s obviously pushing himself—they’re already halfway done laying down the new asphalt when Tim shows up, and Conner is a blur, moving methodically at superspeed to lay in the new surface as quickly as possible. It’s only a few minutes before he and Clark are working on smoothing it out, and then Conner takes off back into town again as Clark stays behind to finish the setting process.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I think I might need your help convincing him to go home,” Tim tells Clark as he finishes up and walks over to join Tim in making his way back towards the heart of town. Tim can see Conner as a shadow flashing back and forth through the glow of the streetlights, too far away to really tell what he’s doing. “As much as I’m sure he’d love to rebuild everything in one night, he does have school tomorrow.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Of course,” Clark says, smiling reassuringly down at Tim. “It <em>is</em> getting pretty late. I’ll help him finish up whatever he’s working on, and then you can get him home.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That turns out to be a pretty wildly optimistic vision of the night, but Tim supposes he should expect nothing less from Clark. Conner, naturally, keeps finding “one more thing” to fix or set up for the next day or finish out, and Tim finally puts his foot down a little after one in the morning.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Kon,” he says, just loud enough that he’s sure Conner will hear him and firm. “It’s <em>late,</em> and both of you have things to do tomorrow. You’re not going to finish putting everything back together before the sun comes up.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Tim,” Conner mutters, pausing in front of Tim without meeting his eyes. He looks dead on his feet, and Tim glares at him. “You don’t—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“If you tell me I don’t understand, I’m going to walk home and tell Ma you couldn’t be bothered to give me a ride,” Tim says, which is the worst threat he can think of after the day they’ve had. The last thing anyone wants right now is the knowledge of Ma’s disappointed frown hanging over their head, waiting for them come morning. “This isn’t my first rodeo, thanks. I know it’s personal, but you working yourself to death isn’t actually going to make anybody feel better.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Tim is right,” Clarks says, touching down beside Conner and putting a hand on his shoulder. “We’ve already made a good start. No one blames you for this, you know. I was listening at city hall—they’re all just worried about you. They were glad when Ma told them that you and I were out here working together, because they figured it must mean you’re okay.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I—” Conner looks back and forth between the two of them for a moment, and Tim braces himself for a fight at the mulish look on Conner’s face. Just like that, it’s gone, though—Conner’s shoulders slump, eyes falling back to the pavement, and he nods reluctantly. “…Alright.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Clark nods at Tim, pats Conner on the shoulder one more time before lifting off into the night, disappearing with a shadowy flutter of his cape. As he goes, Tim steps forwards to tuck himself under Conner’s arm, encouraging him to get them moving. Sighing, Conner tightens his arm around Tim’s waist and lifts him up into the night.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>*</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The house is silent when they get back, and the two of them keep it that way as they change their clothes and crawl into bed. When Tim settles in beside him, Conner stays quiet; he’s obviously not asleep, flat on his back with his hands curled tensely around each other, his eyes trained on the ceiling. He doesn’t react when Tim reaches out to place a hand on the back of his wrist, though, and Tim is suddenly unsure of himself.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Is it… okay if I sleep here?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner doesn’t answer right away, and Tim works hard to keep his heartbeat steady, breathes carefully through his nose to suppress the spike of anxiety he feels. Just as he’s starting to get up to retreat back to the slightly-deflated air mattress, Conner opens his mouth.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I don’t think I should get shit about ‘working myself to death’ from the guy who… who almost….” He doesn’t finish the sentence, overcome with an emotion Tim can’t quite place, but it’s painfully clear to Tim what he means. Biting his lip, Tim lays back down on his side and braces himself for their first argument.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sorry,” he says, trying not to make it worse. “I… probably shouldn’t have put it like that.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“<em>That’s</em> not what I want you to be sorry for,” Conner snaps, rolling over and pushing himself up on one elbow to glare at Tim. “Do you know—do you <em>understand</em>—?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I want to,” Tim says, hopes Conner can hear just how much he means it. “Explain it to me?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Shaking his head, Conner drops onto his back again, grinds the heels of his palms into his eyes. This close, Tim can see the tension in his jaw even in the dark. “You… it’s not like I’ve been trying not to freak out ever since Sujan told us about Simon fucking murdering you, right?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim senses sarcasm, but nods encouragingly, reaches out hesitantly to put a hand on Conner’s shoulder. Conner doesn’t lean into it or look at him, but he doesn’t push Tim away either, so Tim leaves it there, knowing how tactile Conner is. Taking a deep breath, Conner lets his arms fall, crossing them over his face to muffle the next words.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“If I had… if <em>I </em>had…. That’s—that would be it, Tim, alright? World over. I don’t know what you want me to say.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh,” Tim manages, the understanding of exactly how badly he’d screwed up washing over him in a wave that leaves him breathless.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He’d known, of course, that Conner wasn’t happy that he had thrown himself in the line of fire earlier, but connecting all of the dots from their conversations in the last few weeks and his talk with Clark earlier—the fear of hurting people, of never being good enough to make up for the circumstances of his creation, how <em>badly</em> he’d reacted to the thought of Tim dying—understanding how thoughtlessly he had handed Conner one neat little package containing all of his most pressing fears is nauseating. The thought of his own death had been something of an abstraction at the time, a distant possibility to be dealt with later, but it’s hard to breathe as Tim realizes just how real it must have felt to Conner. “I’m—I’m sorry, Conner. I’m sorry.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I just—why would you <em>do</em> that, Tim? Clark can handle me at full strength, but you… you would have….”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I was… pretty sure you were in there somewhere,” Tim tells him, hoping that this isn’t irreparable. “I heard that shitty scientist say you weren’t hurting or killing anyone, and I thought if you were able to fight them on that, you wouldn’t kill me, either. You and Clark are a pretty even match, and you had already hurt him. If it went any further….  I didn’t think you would forgive yourself for that, either, and it seemed like I had better odds.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner makes a wretched little sound, his chest hitching, and rubs his forearm across his eyes. Tim feels his heart break a little. He’s hardly ever seen Conner cry—he’s always so steady and confident, so cheerful, and Tim has to fight down the lump in his own throat knowing that he’s partially responsible for this.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Of course you did,” Conner says, but it sounds more like an admission than an accusation, and Tim cocks his head, eyebrows furrowing.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Was there… something different about Clark?” Tim asks, unable to help himself. Now that he thinks about it, it does seem strange that Conner controlled himself so well with everyone <em>but</em> Clark. “That you were willing to fight him?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner takes a few deep breaths, but it does nothing to suppress the tremors Tim can see in his hands as he clenches his fists and relaxes them again. “…Sometimes I still worry that he wishes I hadn’t been made.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh,” Tim says again, unhelpfully, as his brain scrambles to unpack that statement. “Were you—are you <em>afraid</em> of him?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner shrugs jerkily, turns his head away even though his face is still covered. “Everyone else… you know, I know I’m so much stronger, I have to be really careful, it’s just… instinct, I guess. I <em>can’t</em> hurt anyone. Maybe that was… I was so scared I <em>would</em>, and then Clark showed up, and I was freaked out already. I panicked that he would… try to get rid of me. And it reminded me of—of fighting…. He looks so much like….”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Tim stares, horrified, as he realizes just how much Conner was going through while he was under Lex’s control—not just the fear of hurting someone, the terror of having his free will plucked from his grasp, but worrying that Clark would kill <em>him</em>, reliving his death match with Superboy-Prime. Wriggling closer, he pulls Conner in as much as he can, wrapping one arm around Conner’s chest and holding him tight. “<em>Jesus</em>, Conner. I didn’t… I had no idea. I’m so sorry.”  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I just hate this,” Conner mutters, his voice ragged. “Even when I’m not fucking <em>doing</em> anything I can’t trust that he’s not gonna show up out of nowhere and use me to hurt people. It’s not <em>fair. </em>I don’t want to be dangerous, Tim.” The longer he talks, the quieter he gets, the anger fading into misery in a way that makes Tim’s broken hand itch.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re <em>not</em>,” Tim says in his firmest, most no-nonsense tone. “You’re a good person, Conner, a <em>hero</em>. You’ve given more than a lot of people ever will to make the world safe. <em>Lex</em> is a dangerous asshole, and I’m really sorry you’re stuck with him like this, but I promise you, you’re more than the worst things someone has done to you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Conner makes a choked sound, shoulders heaving, and turns into Tim, presses his face into Tim’s chest and hooks an arm around Tim’s waist so that he’s clinging to Tim with one fist clenched in the back of his shirt. Curling around him as best he can, Tim presses his cheek into Conner’s hair, cards through the shorter strands at the back of Conner’s neck with his good hand.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You’re okay, Conner, I promise,” Tim murmurs, feels Conner shaking under his hands, the heat of Conner’s breath stuttering against his chest. “You stopped. You didn’t hurt anyone, and no one thinks this was your fault. No matter what you try to tell yourself, you’re not a bad person or a danger, and you never will be. The world is a better place with you in it. <em>My</em> world, in particular.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s a soft admission, barely audible even in Tim’s own ears, but he knows Conner hears him. It’s not exactly a revelation after so many years together, supporting each other for so long, but saying it out loud still makes his stomach flip nervously even as he tries to focus on Conner. Conner’s grip on him tightens, and they just stay like that for a while, Tim stroking Conner’s back until the rough, gasping sobs fade into occasional, trembling whimpers, and then finally go quiet. Conner feels even hotter than usual in Tim’s arms, and Tim is grateful that he’s still allowed to hold him through this, hasn’t completely fucked up one of the first truly good things in his life in what feels like a very long time.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“… You know I meant what I said, earlier, right?” Conner asks eventually, the rumble of his voice catching Tim’s attention just as Tim is beginning to wonder if he might have drifted off to sleep. “I mean, I didn’t mean for you to <em>hear</em> it. Was gonna try not to be a weirdo about it, you don’t have to say anything back or whatever, but… you know I meant it?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>As Tim realizes what Conner is talking about, he feels his heart beginning to race nervously, no amount of deep breathing enough to stop it or prevent the flush that feels like it’s overtaking his entire body, heat prickling painfully just under his skin. “I… yeah. Yeah, I know.”</p>
<p><br/>
He wants to say more than that, be able to say <em>something </em>back, but the words stick in his throat, and he bites his lip. Everything is still so new, and he doesn’t want to mess this up, say too much or too little, so he settles for reaching down between them for Conner’s hand, pressing it to his chest where his heart is beating so hard it almost hurts, thumping a hummingbird rhythm against his ribs. “You… you know?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah,” Conner says, and his voice is rough and low, but he pushes himself up to look Tim in the eye, flips his hand around to lace their fingers together. A small, lopsided smile tugs at his lips, the most perfect smile that Tim has ever seen, and he closes his eyes, tipping forward until his forehead touches Tim’s, their breath mingling warmly between them. “I know.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>WELP there was a lot to address but i cant rly resist a fluffy ending, you know?? we're also slowly approaching the end of the entire fic!! it's looking like it will probably be... 17ish chapters, give or take? </p>
<p>also, thank you so much to everyone who commented last chapter!!! it is truly so meaningful to me that so many of you have decided to stick with me this long and even keep leaving comments on every chapter?? it's rly your encouragement that's been keeping me going through these chapters when life has made it tough to do that, and i appreciate it so much bc i love writing this story!! thank you all soooooo so much&lt;333333</p>
<p>on that note, tho, i might not get to an update for a couple of weeks? the end of the semester is coming up and i work retail so like. bad combo u kno. i'll be shooting to get a new chapter finished asap of course, but if you don't seen an update for 3 or 4 fridays please know i'm not abandoning this fic or anything, just busy!! </p>
<p>and final note: i think i'm reviving my old tumblr?? there's not much new there yet lol (still trying to find new blogs to follow!) but i'm <a href="lemontongues.tumblr.com">lemontongues</a> over there if anybody wants to find me!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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